ARGENTINA’S DOUBLE POLITICAL SPECTRUM:

PARTY SYSTEM, POLITICAL IDENTITIES, AND STRATEGIES, 1944–2007

Pierre Ostiguy

Working Paper # 361 - October 2009

Pierre Ostiguy, an assistant professor of political studies at Bard College, specializes in Latin
American politics. He studies party systems, populism, political appeals, and political identity,
with empirical research on Peronism and anti-Peronism in Argentina, and Chavismo and anti-
Chavismo in Venezuela. Ostiguy’s work develops a “spatial analysis” of politics and party
systems focusing on the appeals of parties and candidates (as well as their reception) rather than
policies and issues alone. His articles have appeared in French, English, and Spanish in Revue
Internationale de Politique Comparée, Politique et Sociétés, Revista de Ciencias Sociales, and
the Canadian Journal of Political Science, among other journals. He authored Los Capitanes de
la industria: Grandes empresarios, política y economía en las Argentina de los años 80 (Legasa,
1990), as well as a recent book chapter on Argentine identities and Peronist political culture. He
is currently completing a book entitled “Party Systems and Political Appeals: Populism and
Anti-Populism in Argentina,” to be published by the University of Notre Dame Press. Ostiguy
served as chair of Bard’s Latin American and Iberian Studies program and was a visiting fellow
at the Kellogg Institute for International Studies. He received his PhD from the University of
California at Berkeley.
 ABSTRACT

The paper demonstrates that the Argentine political arena or “party system” is,
has been, and continues to be structured as a two-dimensional space, and more precisely,
at least from 1945 to 2002, as a double political spectrum. This structure for party or
leaders’ competition has resisted and outlasted many regime changes, economic
calamities, and institutionally short-lived political actors. In fact, positions in the two-
dimensional Argentine political space are far more stable than the partisan institutions
themselves; a position abandoned within it leads to the creation of a new partisan actor to
fill it. The dimension orthogonal to the left-right axis, itself very present in Argentina, is
clearly rooted in the social, political, political-cultural, and sociocultural cleavage
between Peronism and the forces opposed to it, or “anti-Peronism.” Both Peronism and
anti-Peronism, moreover, fully range from left to right, thus creating a double political
spectrum in Argentina. This main cleavage, in addition, has been notoriously difficult to
characterize ideologically and politically, also complicating the comparative analysis of
party systems. A key goal of this paper is to show that it is best understood—in a more
general way—as being a conflict and contrast between the “high” and the “low” (Ostiguy
2009) in politics.
This paper combines spatial analysis (including political mapping) with the
qualitative historical analysis it often lacks. The paper examines both political appeals
and their electoral reception—thus taking into account observable political discourse and
differentiated practices as well as more conventional political sociology of voting. The
paper moreover provides an original account, based on appeals and rapidly shifting “axes
of differentiation” in politics, of the creation of what then congealed as the cleavage
between Peronism and anti-Peronism. Overall, the paper constitutes a thorough analysis
of party systems, political identities, and electoral strategies from 1944 up to 2007 in
Argentina within a resilient, structured political space. It is also, as such, an analysis of
Peronism and its opposite.

RESUMEN

Este artículo demuestra que la arena política o el “sistema de partidos” argentino

es, fue y continúa siendo estructurado como un espacio bi-dimensional y más
precisamente, por lo menos desde 1945 hasta el 2002, como un doble espectro político.
Esta estructura para la competencia partidaria o entre líderes ha resistido y sobrevivido a
varios cambios de régimen, calamidades económicas y actores políticos sin duración
institucional. En realidad, las posiciones en el espacio político bi-dimensional argentino
son mucho más estables que las mismas instituciones partidarias; una posición
abandonada dentro de él lleva a la creación de un nuevo actor partidario para llenarla. La
dimensión perpendicular al eje izquierda-derecha, a su vez muy presente en la Argentina,
está claramente arraigada en el clivaje social, político, político-cultural y sociocultural
entre el Peronismo y las fuerzas opuestas a éste, o “anti-Peronismo.” Tanto el Peronismo
como el anti-Peronismo, además, se extienden plenamente desde la izquierda hasta la
derecha, creando asi un doble espectro político en la Argentina. Ese clivaje principal, por
lo demás, ha sido notoriamente difícil de caracterizar ideológica y políticamente,
complicando también el análisis comparado de los sistemas de partidos. Un propósito
clave de este artículo es mostrar que esa división se debe entender—de modo más
general—como un conflicto y contraste entre lo “alto” y lo “bajo” (Ostiguy 2009) en
política.
El artículo combina de modo original el análisis espacial (incluso como
cartografía política) y el análisis histórico cualitativo que muchas veces le hace falta. El
artículo examina tanto las interpelaciones políticas como su recepción electoral, tomando
en cuenta por lo tanto el discurso político y las prácticas diferenciadas así como la más
convencional sociología del voto. El artículo provee además una explicación original,
basada en interpelaciones y “ejes de diferenciación” que fueron cambiando rápidamente,
del surgimiento de lo que se solidificó como el clivaje entre Peronismo y anti-Peronismo.
Con todo, el artículo constituye un análisis completo de los sistemas de partidos,
identidades políticas y estrategias electorales en la Argentina, desde 1944 hasta el 2007,
dentro de un espacio político estructurado y perdurable. También es, en sí, un análisis del
Peronismo y de su opuesto, el anti-Peronismo.
 Ostiguy 1

During the entire second half of the twentieth century, a notable feature of Argentine
politics has been the stability of the main political cleavage that structures its party
system. This endurance is especially remarkable given the country’s otherwise extremely
unstable history: in the last half-century, Argentina has had four military coups, two
bureaucratic-authoritarian regimes, two different populist experiments, two episodes of
restricted liberal democracy with a major political party banned, and full liberal
democracy. Nor was Argentina’s political instability and unpredictability limited to its
changing regime types: there was severe left-right polarization in the 1970s, but also left-
right political coalitions in the 1940s, as well as in 1999–2001 under the Alianza
(Alliance). The economy, often said to have a major impact on politics, was equally
fitful: Argentina’s economy imploded in late 2001 to 2002, the country went through an
episode of hyper-inflation in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the currency was changed
four times in two decades, and the country suffered a drastic recession in 1981–82.
Despite all of this instability and lack of pattern—and, some would say, as a partial cause
of it—the main political cleavage that defines the Argentine party system and more
precisely, Argentina’s structured political space, has remained the same, that is, the one
between Peronism and the political forces opposing Peronism-in-power, i.e., anti-
Peronism.
Yet in spite its resilience, this cleavage has been notoriously difficult to
characterize politically, not to say ideologically. We know that, socially, this cleavage is
to a large extent class based.1 Empirically, educational level is a statistically remarkable
predictor of voters’ preferences across this cleavage.2 But these social characteristics of
the cleavage do not indicate what the cleavage is politically, in contrast to socially. The
electoral coalition that brought Perón to power in 1946, for example, included the newly
formed left-of-center Labor Party as well as right-wing nationalists. The forces opposing
Perón, calling themselves the Democratic Union, ranged from Communists and
Socialists, to Radicales (Radicals), to conservative business sectors.
Politically, Peronism has been regarded by well-established scholars, such as
Torcuato Di Tella, as an eternally proto social-democratic or Labor party, because it is
massively and clearly supported by the unions and the working class, and because, with
varying intensity, it has historically favored redistributionist socioeconomic policies.3
2 Ostiguy

With perhaps equal justification, Peronism has been regarded by other renowned scholars
of a somewhat older generation, who lived during Peronism’s initial decade in power, as
a local variation on, and failed attempt at, a fascist movement (e.g., Halperín 1995
[1956]: 53–54; J. L. Romero 1963 [1946]: 238, 244–254).4 Peronism’s mobilizational,
leader-oriented, nationalist, and somewhat authoritarian character,5 its modern use of the
state for propagandistic purposes, and Perón’s initial pro-Axis and then long-lasting
Franco sympathies are all emphasized in this view. Certainly, Perón did choose Franco’s
Spain for his exile (after a stay with Trujillo) and never hid his admiration for Il Duce. In
his seminal work Political Man, Seymour Martin Lipset attempted to reconcile these two
apparently contradictory perspectives, hailing “the phenomenon known as Peronism” as
the “fascism of the lower class” (1981: 173–76).6 This ingenious resolution, however,
obscures more than it helps.
As if this were not sufficient, in ideological terms Peronism has been sequentially
characterized as fascism, laborism, corporatism, revolutionary socialism (in the 1970s),
national-populism, social-Christian (Perón),7 social democracy (Di Tella),8 neoliberalism
(in the 1990s), according to Halperín and other commentators,9 popular conservatism,
and under the early government of Nestor Kirchner, progressive!
We can, however, find order in what appears politically rather confusing and
shifting. First, although left and right are highly relevant in Argentine politics and within
Argentina’s party system or political space, the main political cleavage in Argentina is
most definitely not defined in left-right terms. Indeed, both Peronism and the various
anti-Peronist forces have fully ranged across the left-right spectrum. In other words, to a
large extent the Peronism/anti-Peronism political cleavage has historically crosscut the
left-right axis. On the anti-Peronist side in Argentina, there is and has been an important
socialist left, dominant among intellectuals, centrist Radicales, and, historically, a pro-US
and pro-market economics right. The same full-blown left-right scale historically existed
within Peronism. Left-right polarization within Peronism reached extremes in the 1970s,
tearing the country apart, when the Peronist left, the Peronist unions center, and the
Peronist far-right all engaged in armed activities against one another. In the late 1960s,
even Perón, while in exile and hosted by Franco, praised Che Guevara10 and is said to
have referred to Mao as “this little Chinese man who steals my ideas.”11 Possibly with
 Ostiguy 3

dark humor, he repeatedly praised a national form of socialism, against capitalist

exploitation and US or Soviet imperialism.
In this paper I show that Argentina’s politics and its party system (or more
broadly, its political space) are structured as a double political spectrum (Figure 1). In
other words, there are two parallel spectra, each ranging from left to right, structuring the
Argentine political space. This raises the important question of the nature of the
dimension orthogonal to the left-right scale, as we need concepts more generic and
substantive than “Peronism” and “anti-Peronism” and similarly want crisp political
categories that travel. In a recent Kellogg Working Paper (Ostiguy 2009), I conceptually
introduced and comparatively discussed the key concepts of high and low in politics.
That paper provides indispensable groundwork for the present paper on Argentina. High
and low together constitute a dimension, and a scale, in politics. The high-low axis is, at
the same time, fully neutral with regard to the left-right spectrum or axis—a quality that
is relatively rare. These two orthogonal political dimensions, i.e., the classical left-right
axis and the high-low dimension, together make up a very useful two-dimensional
political space, which is structured in Argentina as a double political spectrum. The
structure of Argentina’s political space has proven surprisingly enduring, outlasting the
institutional life of many actors—whether political parties or political leaders—which
have appeared and disappeared in Argentina’s politics.12 This mapping and spatial
political framework also accounts for the fact that left-right differences within parties in
Argentina are often greater than those between parties, and it explains why different
parties or party factions that are actually quite similar in their left-right positions often
differ so substantially both in their choice of political alliances and in their social bases.
This two-dimensional space of appeals in politics is thus particularly useful for
understanding political positioning and the social reception of various politicians.
Moreover, as we will see, this two-dimensional political framework and the
related double political spectrum provide an alternative and empirically sound
explanation for the electoral viability of the neoliberal Menem government. There is a
noticeable paradox in the fact that a neoliberal government was mainly supported,
electorally, by the working and lower classes, while it was at the same time largely
opposed, electorally, by the middle and upper-middle classes. This paper documents this
4 Ostiguy

apparent anomaly and explains it logically as well as empirically. The two-dimensional

framework also explains the vicissitudes of the anti-Menem opposition from the left-of-
center Frente Grande (Broad Front, or FG) to the Alianza, the initial “transversal” efforts
of Nestor Kirchner, and his “retreating” in late 2007 to Peronism.
Precisely because Argentina’s political space and party system are structured as a
double political spectrum, it is has been relatively easy and frequent for the Peronist party
(Justicialist Party, or Partido Justicialista, PJ) leadership and the main anti-Peronist
parties to leapfrog one another along the left-right axis, without fundamentally altering
the party system. From 1983 to 1988, the Radical President Raúl Alfonsín moved slowly
but very consistently to the right13 (culminating with his choice of Eduardo Angeloz for
president), while, during that very same period, Peronism moved, inversely, from a
situation that can only be described as rather chaotic along the left-right axis in 1983–84
to a position of center-left opposition—with Antonio Cafiero, the “15,” and Carlos
Menem in 1987–88. In the 1990s, Menem had moved sharply to the right of the political
spectrum, while Alfonsín, in the 1990s, moved to the left. As if that were not sufficient,
during and after the 1999 election, the new leader of the Peronist party, Eduardo Duhalde
(vice-president of the neoliberal Menem), located himself to the center-left of the new
Radical leader and then president of the country, Fernando de la Rúa, and of his
administration.14 In 2002, the Peronist party again spread from left to right, from Nestor
Kirchner and arguably Adolfo Rodríguez Saá, left of center, to José Manuel de la Sota,
up to Carlos Menem much on the right. On the political high, the forced movement
toward the right of the left-of-center Frente País Solidario (Front for a Country in
Solidarity, or FREPASO) as a junior partner of the right-wing de la Rúa government, was
very costly for its institutional existence. The same political space it labored hard to
occupy and unify institutionally, however, has by no mean “disappeared” but was instead
been taken up by the political newcomer Elisa Carrió and her Alternativa por una
República de Iguales (Alternative for a Republic of Equals, or ARI). Few actors,
however, have dared to cross the high-low divide or, moreover, to join in an alliance of
the extreme low with the extreme high (allied on the basis of similar left-right positions).
By contrast, ranging across the opposites of the left-right dimension, Ricardo López
Murphy and Domingo Cavallo, clearly on the right, and the Socialists, on the left, were
 Ostiguy 5

part of the same government. Similarly, in the 1980s, Jorge Triaca on the low-right, and
Revolutionary Peronism on the low-left, were even part of the same “party.”15 In
Argentina, parties do not leapfrog each other and do stay within delimited political areas,
as observed on other continents (Adams 2001:122), but they do so mainly along the high-
low dimension in politics, which is also and at the same time the country’s central
cleavage.16

The paper shows and explains in empirical detail how Argentina’s politics is very
clearly structured as a double political spectrum. It then analyzes how the structuring of
its political space came into existence, in its contemporary form, in the 1940s. To that
end, it employs the fundamental concepts presented and defined in Ostiguy (2009). As I
show in this paper, the fact that the left-right and high-low dimensions are each made up
of two, closely related subdimensions opened up possibilities for incremental but swift
6 Ostiguy

redefinitions of the axis of political competition in Argentina. Actors’ dynamic

exploitation of those possibilities from 1943 to 1946 led to the eventual freezing of the
Peronist/anti-Peronist political divide in high-low, rather than left-right, terms. Once
consolidated, this double political spectrum in Argentina has remained remarkably
durable over the decades, from the 1960s to the present. While Chilean politics, for
example, has been largely structured along a left-right spectrum (with the secular-
religious difference perhaps being a secondary dimension), Argentine politics has been
and continues to be structured politically by the high-low cleavage, with the orthogonal
left-right dimension playing an important but comparatively somewhat secondary role.
The central contribution of this paper is to lay out the structure of Argentina’s
political space. In doing so, using our basic structure the paper also dynamically explains,
empirically, what may be called the paradox of Menemism, alluded to above. It also
helps to account for the differentiated social reception that Menemism and the political
opposition to it each received in Argentine society. It also explains the “continuity in
difference,” in the 2000s.
The present two-dimensional framework and the double political spectrum, first
conceived in an admittedly more rudimentary way by the author as a student back in the
mid-1980s, seems as vital today (2000, 2009)17 as it was more than two decades ago,
despite the many and drastic changes of institutional actors that have occurred in the
Argentine political arena. It now also seems altogether likely that this double political
spectrum and more broadly this structured two-dimensional space will have a few more
decades of continuing existence.

HIGH AND LOW IN ARGENTINE POLITICS

AND ARGENTINA’S DOUBLE POLITICAL SPECTRUM

The High and the Low in Politics: Appeals, Identities, and Political Positioning18

High and low are poles of a dimension in politics; they are neither social groups nor
social strata, even though the high-low dimension in politics does have social
implications. The fascinating relation between the social and the political is studied
empirically in this paper. Second, this political space is about political appeals, a broad
 Ostiguy 7

but indispensable category discussed in detail earlier in this series (Ostiguy 2009). Most
definitely, programs—whether economic or issue related—can be used, and are used, as
appeals in politics. Third, recurrent appeals can lead to the creation of, be associated with,
or keep alive certain political identities, as is the case in Argentina—or they may not,
especially if given appeals crosscut a different, already constituted political divide.
Certainly, identities imply a much longer time frame than a single political appeal. For
this reason, political identities are usually linked to a political cleavage, and the most
common political identities in a polity are in fact a constitutive component of that polity’s
main political cleavage. Fourth, in my view, neither pole of the high-low is, in and of
itself, more “democratic” than the other, even though each clearly relates, in its own
specific way, to key components of democracy.
The high-low dimension is, just like left and right, made up of two subdimensions
or components (see Figure 2). These subdimensions, again like those constitutive of left
and right, are at sharp angles in relation to one another, i.e., are highly correlated.
Positions on the high-low dimension, however, may be more difficult to change in a fully
credible way than left-right positioning, itself quite unstable in the case of many Latin
American politicians. High and low can be said to be about recognition and
identification, whether these are with issue position and/or politicians. While some would
like to see high and low as “only” about “political style,” they actually connect deeply
with a society’s history, its group identities and, quite often, resentments, and with
differing criteria for assessing what is likeable and normatively acceptable.

The first component of the high-low axis is the social-cultural appeal in politics.
This component has to do with manners, demeanors, ways of speaking and dressing, and
tastes displayed in public. On one pole, people publicly present themselves as well
behaved,19 proper, composed, and perhaps even bookish. Negatively, they can appear as
stiff, rigid, serious, colorless, somewhat distant, and boring. On the other pole, people
frequently use a language that includes slang or folksy expressions and metaphors, are
more demonstrative in their bodily or facial expressions as well as in their demeanor, and
display more raw, culturally popular tastes. Politicians on the low are capable of being
more uninhibited in public and are more apt to use coarse or popular language. They
8 Ostiguy

often appear—at least to the observer on the high—as more “colorful.” While one may
wish to call this dimension class-cultural, I have found that it is empirically most closely
correlated, though not synonymous, with educational level. Although concrete
sociocultural differences exist in all societies, these differences are usually not attached to
political identities. In some cases, however, sociocultural differences do become
politicized, in that cultural patterns such as manners, declared tastes, language and mode
of behavior in public become associated with political identities or political choice.
The second component of the high-low dimension of appeals in politics is
political-cultural. This dimension is about forms of political leadership and preferred or
advocated modes of decision-making in the polity. On one pole, one finds political
appeals consisting of claims20 to favor formal, impersonal, legalistic, institutionally-
mediated models of authority. On the other pole, one finds political appeals emphasizing
personalistic, strong (and generally male) leadership. Personal versus impersonal
authority is perhaps a good synthesis of this polarity. The pole arguing for impersonal
authority generally claims to represent “procedural normalcy” (at least as a goal to be
achieved) in the conduct of public life. The personalist pole generally claims to be much
closer to “the people” and to represent them better than the pole claiming or arguing for a
more impersonal, procedural, proper model of authority. In practice, one finds on the low,
to use Peronist language, the appeals of leaders “con pelotas” (“with balls”), who know
how to lead the people. To paraphrase Aldo Rico, they “doubt” less (as “doubt is the
bragging of intellectuals”). The low often entails a preference for decisive action (often at
the expense of some “formalities”) over the “niceties” that accompany the rule of law.
These two components of the high-low axis very much have in common, as
unusual as it may sound in our field of political science, the level of sublimation and of
suppression that is judged ideal in the exercise of leadership and authority. The high is
definitely more abstract and restrained, thus claiming to be more proper, whether in
manners or in procedure. The low is earthier, more concrete, into immediacy.21 On the
political-cultural dimension, it can be said that political authority on the low is less
mediated. Mediation undoubtedly involves a more sublimated type of practice. On the
social-cultural dimension, however, from the normative standpoint of the high, “cruder”
and “more refined” are correct descriptions.
Ostiguy 9
10 Ostiguy

As a last observation, it should be noted that the “immediate” is more concrete,

immanent, earthy, and culturally localist (“from here”), while the reverse is true of
abstracting mediation. The high tends to justify its concerns in more abstract terms and to
convey them through more “universalizing,” less culturally localized language.
Together, the orthogonal left-right and high-low axes form a two-dimensional
political space of appeals, in which we locate actors, parties, and politicians.
Theoretically, as these two axes are fully neutral with regard to one another, any
combination (for example forming four quadrants) is not only possible, as is the case with
spaces configured even by non-orthogonal axes, but equally possible. And indeed, in
Argentina, political actors have settled the entire political space. In this light, strategies of
political appeal are multiplied because there are equally possible ways of translating
somewhat similar social contrasts into politics, and thus of appealing to similarly situated
voters. Each of these ways is then, both in theory and practice, equally combinable with
any position on the orthogonal dimension.

From “The First Tyranny” to the Second: Sarmiento’s Civilization and Barbarism
and the Characterization of a Twentieth-Century Cleavage

The high-low axis is deeply rooted in Argentine political and social history. It goes back
to one of the key founding myths—at least from the high standpoint—of the modern
Argentine nation: the famous image of “civilization and barbarism.”22 The myth is
associated with one of Argentina’s most important nineteenth-century public figures:
Domingo Sarmiento. For modern Argentina’s founding fathers, the combination of, on
the one hand, good manners, the frock, urbanity, civility and, on the other, republicanism
and respect for institutions (i.e., the high pole of each of the two sub-dimensions of the
high-low axis) stood at the very core of their modernist project for the country. The
opposite combination, represented by the Federal caudillos’ style of leadership, and their
gaucho supporters’ uncouth lifestyle (especially in the montoneras, or troops of gaucho
rebels following a caudillo),23 constituted their nightmare.
Sarmiento saw the Argentine hinterland, its “essence,” as fundamentally
“barbaric,” primitive, unsophisticated, indomitable, and careless.24 This barbarism had to
be eradicated, together with the lawless and brutish caudillos to which it gave rise, and be
 Ostiguy 11

replaced by “civilization.” The latter corresponded to an idealized version of literate,

cultured, and self-disciplined northwestern Europe. The project indeed triumphed
politically during the second half of the nineteenth century.
Of course, the actual behavior and demeanor of the immigrants, who flooded
Buenos Aires and the provinces of the littoral en masse from Southern and Eastern
Europe, did not actually correspond to this idealized image of cultured and polished,
urbane, self-disciplined Europeans. In the first half of the twentieth century, the notion of
“civilization and barbarism” became detached from rural/urban cultural differences—the
particular rural world depicted in Facundo and later in Martín Fierro was becoming
extinct—and the polarity attached itself to class differences instead (see Svampa 1994).
The popular sectors, with their rude manners and often disorderly conduct, became a
threat, especially when acting under the influence of radical anarchism, to the liberal
oligarchic project that had become dominant. To put it schematically, in that structuring
dichotomy, the urban worker started to replace the gaucho. In the 1940s, as we will see,
Perón came to be characterized negatively by the opposition as the new caudillo, the new
Juan Manuel de Rosas, the “second tyranny.”25 With the workers (many of whom
originated from the hinterland) taking the place of Sarmiento’s gauchos, and with Perón
as the new Rosas, the newly emerging anti-”Peronist” opposition politically recreated in
its full strength Sarmiento’s founding dichotomy between “civilization” and “barbarism.”
By the 1960s, the Peronist left adopted this characterization, but reversed its normative
poles. The Montoneros (of the militant Movimiento Peronista Montonero, or Montonero
Peronist Movement) were created, taking their name from such a characterized
nineteenth-century repertoire, while, under the influence of historical revisionism
(originally on the right in the 1930s), the Peronist left started to revere Rosas as well as
all of the nineteenth-century Federal caudillos. This type of political labeling became
very widespread. Even within the armed forces, the two sides in an armed conflict
between Peronist sympathizers and anti-Peronists in 1962 named themselves,
respectively, the “crude” and the “cooked.”
This set of oppositions and hailings do not pertain only to the realm of symbolic
dichotomies used to hail and name Argentine political adversaries.26 Argentina is in fact
spectacular, by world standards, in the extremes that it reaches on the concrete,
12 Ostiguy

measurable,27 high-low axis. The range stretches all the way from the aesthetic and
cultural refinement of Jorge Luis Borges, whose disdain for Peronism also reached
unprecedented levels (and who has been accused, not unjustly, of elitism and
“foreignizing” orientations), to the brutish and boorish ex-Peronist gubernatorial
candidate Herminio Iglesias, who could not conjugate properly in Spanish and who was
widely linked to criminal activities in the Buenos Aires district of Avellaneda. Borges
and Iglesias both have been eminently politicized, each becoming a political symbol
vilified by those on the opposite side of the Peronist/ anti-Peronist divide. Peronists
viewed Borges as the most virulent figure of what anti-Peronism stands for
socioculturally,28 while anti-Peronists viewed Iglesias as the worst sociocultural
embodiment of Peronism.

The High-Low Political Spectrum and Polarity in Argentina

There exists a vast spectrum ranging between these two poles. The high may be divided
into extreme and moderate variants. The very-high is manifestly well-read, cultured, and
displays a high level of cultural or technical capital. Though numerically small, this
position is endowed with significant symbolic and institutional capital. It ranges from the
“Althusserian” left of the 1970s, to Socialist intellectuals on the center-left, to well-
mannered and cultured public figures like television host Mariano Grondona on the right.
The moderate-high has a cultural outlook that resembles that of the middle sectors
of developed countries. While such an outlook is quite hegemonic in societies like the
US, in Argentina it is only one position among many, and not even the socially
predominant one. Politicians representing this position have been drawn from parties all
along the left-right spectrum. They include human rights (and later FREPASO) leader
Graciela Fernández Meijide, Unión Cívica Radical (Radical Civic Union, UCR) leaders
such as Raúl Alfonsín and Federico Storani, Peronist deputy Miguel Ángel Toma, and
neoliberal television host Bernardo Neustadt. A large number of moderate-high
politicians are from the Federal Capital, which has an average income and level of
education superior to the national median.
 Ostiguy 13

The low may also be divided into moderate and extreme tendencies. The
moderate-low is characterized by a conspicuously informal style in politics. It is very
“Latin” in that it is very “warm,” “casual,” demonstratively affectionate publicly, and
“fun.” From a high perspective, it is often tacky. Examples include “historical” PJ
politicians such as Domingo Mercante, Héctor (“the uncle”) Cámpora, and Antonio
Cafiero, as well as more recent PJ candidates like pop singer Palito (“Little Stick”)
Ortega and boating champion Daniel Scioli. The use of nicknames to designate moderate-
low politicians and public figures—a phenomenon impossible to imagine for the very-
high—should be underscored. In terms of known political writers, Arturo Jauretche, with
his informal mode of expression (despite his serious content), is a good example of the
moderate-low. The Peronist intellectual magazine Unidos is an expression of this style
closer to us in time, in sharp contrast to high political magazines such as Punto de Vista
or Ciudad Futura.
The very-low has “balls” (pelotas); it is rougher and led by “real men” who can
“lead the people” and do not hesitate on the means to “get things done.” The term
“caudillo” is clearly used here as a term of praise. Socioculturally, the very-low is
associated with the milieu of the urban lower sectors—particularly with the masculine
skills required for survival and respect in this environment—as well as with the most
rural areas, especially those of the northern interior. Writing of the “inorganic
democracy” that developed between leaders and masses in the nineteenth century, J. L.
Romero describes the caudillistic mode of political representation in the following way:
The caudillo depended on the masses and gained popular support by exacerbating
class feeling. He generally stood out because of the excellence with which he
practiced the virtues they admired: he was the bravest, the most daring, the most
skillful” (1963 [1946]: 109–110).29

Linked to these leadership aspects is the typical (in the view of many anti-Peronists)
very-low practice of patoterismo, that is, of intimidation with the aim of “sending a
message”30 or securing physical spaces (walls, space in a rally) for political proselytism.
Although anti-Peronists tend to view such self-styled “caudillismo” as “barbaric”
and “appalling,” it is an image that low politicians self-consciously maintain. Thus,
Carlos Menem, while campaigning in his own rugged northern province of La Rioja,
14 Ostiguy

declared: “They are branding us as ruffians. But from this manly and brave La Rioja, I
can tell you that it is better to be a ruffian than a traitor selling out the fatherland.”31
Menem in the 1970s and 1980s, with his huge sideburns and horseback rides in a poncho,
is a clear example of a very-low appeal. Other examples include Peronists like Herminio
Iglesias, the Saadi Clan, and Luis Barrionuevo, as well as ex-Carapintada32 leader Aldo
Rico.
High-low differences are reinforced by the images that each side holds of the
other. Anti-Peronists tend to be appalled by very-low Peronists. They characterize them
as bestias, or uncultured boors, and as lacking in ethics or principles. They associate
symbols such as the Peronist March, mass rallies, and bombos (large, very loud drums)
with the “negros33 and undisciplined, loutish, and violent behavior. These sociocultural
and politico-cultural traits frustrate the anti-Peronists’ desired image of Argentina as a
“normal” country, of largely European descent. Peronists, by contrast, view anti-Peronists
as snobbish, distant, cold-hearted, and full of highfalutin language. They also tend to
view anti-Peronists’ cosmopolitan orientation as putting on “European airs” and even
being unpatriotic.
Figure 3 captures the politicized characterizations, at the mass level, of each side
of the Peronist/anti-Peronist divide. In line with the definition of high and low already
provided, it does so in three domains of characterization: the sociocultural; the political
leadership or mode authority said to be preferred; and the historically important
politicized adjectives regarding the cultural relation to the “outside/abroad” and the
“inside/hinterland” (afuera and interior) of the country.
16 Ostiguy

Argentina’s Double Political Spectrum

Argentine politics has historically been organized along a double political spectrum,
composed of two parallel spectra, each ranging from left to right. In other words, each
position along the left-right political axis is multiplied by two. The high-left is occupied
by Marxist and Socialist organizations. Historically, both the Communist and Socialist
parties were internationalist in orientation and heavily influenced by intellectual debates
abroad. A Peronist worker described the Communists as: “regimented like little tin can
soldiers. …They have too disciplined a view for Argentines” (quoted in Ranis 1992:126-
27). The Communists moreover maintained a certain bookish orientation, prizing
theoretical “rigor” and placing a greater emphasis on abstract and professorial
explanations of society than on working class mobilization. Marxism is, of course, highly
theoretical: even its terminology (bourgeois, proletarian) is more abstract and less
“commonsensical” than the Peronist categories of pueblo (people), descamisados
(shirtless), and humildes (poor, humble people). The Socialists also emphasized book
learning. Indeed, the Socialist Club served as a meeting place for some of Argentina’s
most sophisticated and highbrow intellectuals. Socialist Party appeals centered more on
ethical public behavior, honesty, and citizens’ rights than on worker mobilization. Indeed,
before the advent of Peronism, the Socialist Party distinguished itself through its efforts
to promote public libraries and conferences in popular neighborhoods (Romero 1986;
Romero and Gutiérrez 1989 and 1995; Romero 2006) and—”higher” still—through its
campaign against drinking and smoking among the working class.
The low-left is quite different. Low-left groups such as the Montoneros and the
Peronist Youth (Juventud Peronista, or JP) also considered themselves socialist and
revolutionary; but their rhetoric and appeals were infinitely much cruder and less
intellectualized than the Marxist and socialist parties, which they disliked, viewed as “in
the clouds” and as not understanding the concrete reality and ways of the Argentine
people. The Montoneros took their name from the hordes of Federal horsemen (presented
as “barbaric” in the established, older liberal view of Argentine history), made up of
unkempt, lower-class, and fierce gauchos, in their localist fight against Buenos Aires’
centralizing and “civilizing” Unitarians. They identified with Eva Perón, whom they
viewed as a social revolutionary dedicated to the poor and the “shirtless,” and they
 Ostiguy 17

emphasized the anti-oligarchic, mobilizational, and socially redistributive aspects of

Peronism. Unlike the bookish high-left, the rhetoric of the low-left was often extremely
crude. Thus, typical JP chants included: “Hard, hard, hard...they shove it up their ass.
Now, now, those of the Libertadora suck our balls” and “the working class wants the
stick, to make the sons of bitches dance.” In the 1990s, a representative of the low-left
was union leader Carlos “The Dog” Santillán.
The high-center emphasizes ethics, civic behavior, and proceduralism. Steeped in
liberal theory, it has a long tradition of defending the rule of law, civic rights, pluralism,
and republican institutions. Its discourse is more about the citizenry than the pueblo.
Since the late nineteenth century, the high-center space has been occupied mostly by the
Radical Civic Union. Always more civic than radical, the UCR has long been associated
with mild manners, a minimum of propriety, and tolerance. Inversely, it has been
associated with meek governments, incapable or unwilling to grab “the bull by the horns”
and refusing to build strong alliances with the concrete “factors of power,” relying
instead on the vaguer concept of “citizen mandate.” The UCR has traditionally
encompassed factions that range from the center-left to the center-right. Although its
economic program has varied across time, it has generally adhered to center or center-left
programs such as developmentalism and Keynesianism.
The low-center, since the 1940s, has been occupied by “classical” or
“mainstream” Peronism–although several minor provincial parties are also located on the
low center-right. As with the high-center Radical governments of Illia and Alfonsín, the
low-center has been associated with a mixed economy, the import substitution model, and
a role of the state in public welfare, while being decidedly non-revolutionary and anti-
communist. In contrast to the Radical governments, however, such policies are associated
in their low variant with the concrete needs of the humildes or the pueblo, rather than
with such abstract ideas as being “progressive” and “civic” or with economic theories
(such as Keynesianism). Low-center politicians are more likely to focus on simply
“delivering the goods.” Furthermore, politicians on the low always claim to be “true
representatives” of the local setting, and to “get things done.” While politicians on the
high often aim for the moral high ground, politicians on the low claim to be “rooted” or,
as it seems from the high, appear as colorful, backward, or simply “appalling.” In the
18 Ostiguy

rural setting of La Rioja, a vivid example of the low-center in the 1980s was its Governor
Carlos Menem, the “Tiger of Anillaco,” with his huge sideburns and galloping horse
rides in poncho. Representatives of the low-center include powerful union leaders such as
Augusto Vandor and Lorenzo Miguel (with their thuggish image and pragmatic, “bread
and butter” orientation) and “traditional” Peronist leaders such as Eduardo Duhalde and
(higher) Antonio Cafiero, or the founding Peronist figure Domingo Mercante.
The high-right believes in rationality and efficiency (though often not
democracy), and it has often adopted a class-conscious interpretation of what
“civilization” is. Often associated with the “oligarchy” and its institutions, such as the
Rural Society and the Jockey Club, as well as with—at times—its military allies, the
high-right is economically conservative and culturally cosmopolitan. It is certainly very
fond of order (for capital accumulation and “progress”) and has been described by
O’Donnell (1973: 78–82) in his writings on “technocratic roles.” Like the high-left, it
tends to be European—or (here) US—oriented and thus prone to attacks on the low for
being “anti-Argentine.” Representatives of the high-right include Borges, conservative
leader Álvaro Alsogaray, ex-military dictator Jorge Videla, and Economic Ministers such
as José Martinez de Hoz and (lower) Domingo Cavallo. In the post-1983 period, the high-
right space was filled by the Unión de Centro Democrático (Union of the Democratic
Center, or UCeDe) and, less significantly, several (lower) provincial parties.
The low-right, by contrast, tends to be nativist, ultra-nationalist, and, importantly,
oriented toward strong (male) leadership. Unlike the cosmopolitan high-right, it claims to
be rooted in the particular cultural traits of the “people of the nation.” The low-right
places a strong emphasis on authority and social order, is staunchly anti-leftist, and is
generally pro-military. It tends to emphasize strict loyalty (verticalismo, or “verticalism”)
to the conductor (leader). Whereas the rhetorical focus of the Peronist left is on the
“shirtless” or lo popular (the popular), the Peronist right focuses on the Argentine nation
(instead of the pueblo), the flag (instead of the rags), and lo nacional (more than lo
popular). Representatives of the low-right include orthodox Peronist leaders such as
Herminio Iglesias, Isabelista minister José López Rega, conservative unionists such as
Jorge Triaca and Armando Cavalieri, and, certainly, Alberto Brito Lima. In its more
extreme form, the low-right is characterized by a strong military ethos, bellicose
 Ostiguy 19

nationalism, and a fascination with violence. Examples of the extreme low-right include
paramilitary groups such as Comando de Organización (literally, the “Organization
Commando”) and arguably the Iron Guard in the 1970s, the Carapintada military rebels
in the 1980s, and the officially non-Peronist Movement for Dignity and National
Independence (Movimiento por la Dignidad y la Independencia Nacional, or MODIN)—
led by the crude and “macho” Aldo Rico—in the 1990s.34
Despite the fact that left-right differences between low and high groups were
often quite narrow, alliances or defections across the Peronist/anti-Peronist cleavage were
extremely infrequent. Thus, whereas voters and sometimes public figures frequently
oscillated between the Socialists and the Radicales (both of which put strong discursive
emphasis on public ethics, civic behavior, and cultural capital), there has been
remarkably little cooperation or party switching between the Socialists and labor-based
left-of-center Peronists. Although these groups always shared a similar socioeconomic
program, the sociocultural distance between them is enormous. A similar phenomenon
occurred on the right, where conservative elites and right-wing Peronists shared an
antipathy toward “subversives” but rarely spontaneously cooperated. Intra-cleavage
alliances are much more common. Thus, Socialists, Radicals, and high conservatives
could come together in the Democratic Union in 1946 and the Alliance in 1997, while
Peronism aligned with (and absorbed) the low-right MODIN in the late 1990s.

GENESIS AND EVOLUTION OF ARGENTINA’S ENDURINGLY

STRUCTURED POLITICAL SPACE

We will now analyze how this double political spectrum came about in Argentina, and
then trace its durability, decade after decade (during which the historical context changed
drastically), up to the contemporary period. The centrality of the high-low divide also
explains why political groupings with otherwise similar left-right positions routinely
align in opposite camps or appeal to different social bases.
20 Ostiguy

The Critical Juncture: The Rise of Peronism and the Creation of the Double
Political Spectrum (1943–1946)

Between 1943 and 1946, Argentine politics experienced a remarkable series of shifts
along dimensions defining political conflict. In the immediate wake of the 1943 military
coup, a left-right divide was clearly discernible, as a right-wing nationalist military
regime, focusing on order and authority, confronted a leftist, internationalist, and liberal-
democratic opposition led primarily by students and intellectuals.35 Although neither side
mobilized the working and lower classes, the leftist opposition was more ideologically
disposed to a working-class alliance than was the government.
During 1944 and early 1945, however, the axis defining political conflict began to
shift from the left-right dimension to the high-low dimension. First, the nationalist right
lost much of its power within the military regime. Second, in the face of mounting
opposition by civil society and a changed international climate due to the victory of the
Allies, the military regime took steps to democratize in mid-1945, announcing (clean)
elections to be held before the end of the year. Third, there arose within the regime a
strong leader, not overly attached to procedural rule, who combined a nationalist and
localist discourse with a culturally popular demeanor and redistributive socioeconomic
policies.
While it is well known that then Labor and Social Security Secretary Perón built
working-class support through a range of economically pro-labor policies, he was at the
same time the very first Argentine politician to make systematic appeals on the low.
Though tame by today’s standards, these appeals were highly controversial in the
Argentina of the 1940s.36 It included using an informal, very colloquial style and popular
slang; culturally marked actions such as taking off his jacket at public rallies; and his
relationship with Evita, who had a reputation for promiscuity linked to her job as an
actress and her social background. According to Silberstein, Perón,
talked to the workers in their own language.... [He] was the one who made politics
fun, who allowed one to dance in the street, to shout well- or ill-intentioned songs,
full of happiness and swearing at the top of one’s voice; who took off his shirt and
stayed in shirt sleeves, like one does at work or at home; [and] who spoke against
the bosses, against the oligarchs, those who sold out the motherland (Silberstein
1972: 98).
 Ostiguy 21

Throughout 1944–45, the effect of Perón’s combined socioeconomic and socio-

cultural appeal, together with some police measures directed at non-cooperative leftist
union leaders, was to increase the potential importance of the working and lower classes
as an effective source of political support for Perón himself, more than for the
“Revolution of 1943” itself. This social support materialized in the mythical founding
event of Peronism: the spontaneous mass rally of October 17, 1945, at which a multitude
of workers demanded the liberation of “their” Colonel, who had been imprisoned by
regime soft-liners.37 In his famous October 17 speech from the presidential balcony
following his release, Perón fused the regime’s nationalism and concern for order with
his own personal leadership and the culturally popular:
Workers!...This is the suffering pueblo that represents the pain of the motherland,
which we will vindicate...Mingled with this sweating mass, I hug you all hard and
long against my heart, as I would do with my mother....From this hour,...may
Colonel Perón be the link of union that will make the brotherhood between the
pueblo, the army, and the police indestructible. May this union be eternal so that
this pueblo grows in the spirit of the...authentic forces of nationality and order.38

As a result of these shifts, what had been a nationalist, pro authority-and-order,

clerical, and overall right-wing project could certainly not, by 1945, be defined as right-
wing in terms at least of one of the two subdimensions of left and right. 39 Politically, it
was now clearly on the low in both subdimensions of high and low.
The nature of the opposition also, and at the very same time, changed
considerably during 1945. What had once been a left-wing democracy movement against
military rule shifted into a “civic” coalition, politically on the high. With the inclusion of
the main, Alvearista (or ex-President Marcelo T. de Alvear’s “Alvearist”) wing of the
UCR in mid-1945, the opposition movement became a civic-republican front demanding
free elections, the rule of law, and an immediate return to constitutional rule. Interpreting
the rise of Perón as the advent of a (pro-Axis) “above procedures” strong leader with a
mass following, these opposition forces came to view the regime as not so much a
conservative military dictatorship but, now and in light of the above, as essentially
mobilizational, demagogical, and “fascist.”
With the launching of Perón’s presidential candidacy, subsequent to the October
17 working-class mobilization in support of Perón, the definition of the political situation
22 Ostiguy

continued to shift even more. The dimension defining the political conflict between
“Perón-ism” and its opponents was now entirely, as well as conspicuously, high-low. The
opposition forces, in reaction to what they viewed as Perón’s “demagogic” leadership
style, began to talk of “morality in politics,” “legality,” “the calming of passions,” and the
“educated efforts of the citizenry.”40 UCR leaders declared, for example, that
with a cynicism unprecedented in the annals of civility, against all norms of
respect and social cohabitation...the country suffers the asphyxia of its essential
rights and is at the mercy of a sensual and irresponsible coterie which...seeks to
impose the candidacy of the greatest demagogue of our history.41

Increasingly, however, the opposition to Perón took an explicit social-cultural

turn (see the two subdimensions of high and low in Figure 2). As Halperín notes, the
opposition was scandalized by Perón’s
break with a political—and not only political—style on which people located in
ideologically opposite positions had previously agreed. Since October 17, Perón
had become the head of the “shirtless,” and this naming was not only symbolic;
many of his supporters had been seen that day in the street without this garment,
and although the leader of the movement always refused the invitations of the
supporting multitude to imitate it, he immodestly displayed himself without a
coat...These shocking innovations in style reached their most significant level
with Perón’s marriage to Eva Duarte (Halperín 1991: 54).

The opposition’s response not only to Perón’s form of political leadership but also
to his emerging working- and lower-class concrete following crucially became, as well,
increasingly class-cultural in nature. Luna’s description of the left’s reaction to the
October 17 mobilization is particularly telling in this regard:
The Socialist Party and the Communist Party had intellectually elaborated an
ideal worker, an archetype that looked much like the upright artisan of
disciplined militancy who came to the popular library, did not drink alcohol or
smoke, and could cite Marx and Spencer...When the sight of those workers in
flesh and blood, workers who were not Marxist redeemers but common men
who sweated, swore, and drank cheap wine...hit them, they chose to deny that
this was the proletarian reality of the country (1969: 349).

Precisely because of the interpretation they initially developed of the political

situation from mid-1943 to early 1945, leftists were forced to come up with a reason why
people from the popular sectors would follow a leader who was “obviously” not on the
left. After October 17, La Vanguardia (Socialist) and La Hora (Communist) came up
 Ostiguy 23

with an account that depicted Perón’s followers not as workers (allegedly still
communists, socialists, etc.) but as part of the lumpen proletariat: hoodlums, ruffians,
drunkards, prostitutes.42 From left to right, oddly enough, many public figures on the high
started to conflate “barbarism from above” (that of Perón, Rosas, the caudillos) with
“barbarism from below” (that of the “hordes”, the “lumpen,” the malón or Indian raid, the
gaucho montoneras) (Svampa 1994: 253): that is, an authoritarian and culturally nativist
demagogue with unruly and dangerous “hordes.”
The opposition actually played a central role in the sociocultural turn of the
campaign, inventing a variety of imaginative new sociocultural terms to denigrate
Perón’s followers. Interestingly, these terms were often re-appropriated by the Peronists.
An example is the epithet “shirtless,” which, though originally employed as an insult by
the Socialist La Vanguardia, was quickly adopted by Perón and transformed into a point
of pride.43
The transformation of the opposition was completed when the conservative
economic elites, responding to Perón’s statist and redistributionist economic program,
finally joined the anti-Perón coalition, started in 1943 by Communists and Socialists. At
this point, it no longer made sense at all to characterize the Peronist/anti-Peronist
cleavage in the left-right terms of 1943. The final result was a broad alliance of leftists,
“proper” middle sectors, and big business, all claiming to favor the “constitution” and
republicanism. Thus, the Democratic Union that opposed Perón in 1946 included the
Communist and Socialist parties, the bulk of the UCR, and the conservative Argentine
Industrial Union (Unión Industrial Argentina, or UIA).
The 1946 electoral campaign brought sociocultural as well as politico-cultural
issues to the fore, establishing them as a constitutive element of Peronist and anti-
Peronist identities. On one side was Perón, taking his coat off, using slang expressions,
engaging in informal practices, and—a highly personalist strong leader—followed by
crude murgas (boisterous “carnavalesque” street dancers) and unruly so-called “hordes.”
On the other side, the opposition emphasized propriety and civic behavior, as well as
institutions, claiming high-level abstract principles.
24 Ostiguy
 Ostiguy 25

A highly significant theoretical finding of this section is the fact that, at least in
the case of Argentina in the 1940s, the two parts of Figure 2 (the two subdimensions of
high-low; the two subdimensions of left-right) can, conceptually and theoretically, be
superimposed upon one another (as a “wheel”). In this way, Figure 2 gives rise to Figure
4. Figure 4 theoretically and historically orders the narrative of this section on the 1940s.
The superimposition of the ordered subdimensions of left-right and of high-low on a two-
dimensional, “flat” space thus importantly gives rise, graphically and conceptually, to a
360 “wheel” of axes of appeals in politics.44 In it, all of the subdimensions of Figure 2,
together, form “spikes” or axes that define potential—and in this actual case, very real—
ordered political divides
During the key 1943–46 period, since no original actors deserted the coalitions as
the conflict incrementally but rapidly shifted from one dimension to the other, the broad
political configurations shown in the gray areas of Figure 4 formed and later crystallized.
In fact, the different thematic, political areas (the outer ring of Figure 4) of these two
broad configurations have constituted, since then, important elements of Peronism and
anti-Peronism, as well as of their corresponding identities. While these elements were
separate and arguably unrelated before 1943, they thus gradually became recognizable
elements of Peronist and anti-Peronist identities. Moreover, once they congealed as a
political divide after this critical juncture, they also became quite recognizable
components (on the structuring left-right and high-low axes) of the double political
spectrum.

The Durability of the Double Political Spectrum

Just as the military coup of 1955, directed specifically against Peronism, and the military
coups of 1966 and 1976, directed at the political game as a whole, failed to destroy
Peronism, they also failed to transform the Argentine party system and, more
importantly, the double political spectrum ordering it. The post-1955 period saw the
emergence of a variety of new political forces, but these groups’ positions and alliances
reinforced the high-low cleavage rather than crosscutting or blurring it. And although
Peronism and its opponents underwent substantial changes along the left-right axis, their
positioning on the high-low axis remained relatively stable.
26 Ostiguy

The 1960s and the 1970s. The 1955 “Liberating Revolution” sought to transform
Argentine politics by eradicating the “anomaly” of Peronism. Many military,
intellectuals, and socioeconomic elites viewed the post-1955 period as an opportunity to
restore “normalcy” after more than a decade of “tyranny” and “boorishness.” Thus,
shortly after Perón’s overthrow, Borges published “L’illusion comique,” or “The Comic
Illusion,” which described the Perón period as one of
opprobrium and foolery, [during which] the canons of pulp fiction were applied to
the government of the Republic. There were two stories: one of a criminal
nature...and the other of a staged nature, made up of stupidity or gross ignorance
and fairy tales for the consumption of boors and bumpkins (1955: 9–10).

Yet efforts to stamp out Peronism and the political low were a failure. Though
radically transformed by Perón’s overthrow, Peronism not only survived but moved even
further to the low. A period of non-institutional violence by the working-class Peronist
resistance responded to the anti-Peronist campaign of the “libertadora”45 (or so-called
“liberating”) government. Later, under the liberal semi-democratic46 governments of
Arturo Frondizi and Arturo Illia, Peronist circles emerged and grew, throughout the
1960s and 1970s, where a more “intellectual” and militant leadership were reappropriated
the negative characterizations of both the nineteenth-century federal camp as depicted by
liberal historiography and of the Peronists by anti-Peronists. This reappropriation of the
“barbaric,” so to speak , included the claiming of both the “tyranny” of the caudillo Rosas
(especially on the Peronist right) and of the roaming montoneras (especially on the
Peronist left). At the same time, Sarmiento and Juan Bautista Alberdi as historical
figures, and Borges as a cultural one, became national foes.47
The endurance of politicized high-low differences meant that left-right conflicts
continued to be crosscut by the high-low axis, and, as a result, each position along the
left-right axis continued to be multiplied by two, as mapped in Figure 5.
28 Ostiguy

On the radical left, in the 1970s, two distinct guerrilla organizations prospered.
The People’s Revolutionary Army (Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, or ERP) was
Marxist and internationalist. It hoisted the red flag and took the struggles of the—rather
foreign—Vietcong as a model.48 The ERP boasted of having a theoretically clear political
line, as is often the case with the Marxist left. Clearly to its right stood the pro-Soviet
Communist Party.
On the very low-left, in contrast, were the Montoneros and the JP. Much more
nationalist than the ERP, and also very crude in their political rhetoric, the Montoneros
took their name from the montoneras, described above, and claimed to fight in the name
of the poor, the shirtless, or the “true Argentine people,” i.e., the “people of Perón,” more
than to follow a Marxist line or other internationalist ideologies. Although the
Montoneros, like the ERP, recruited heavily from among the radicalized middle-class
youth, it was a fascination with the pueblo, the slums, and the so-called descamisados—
more than with revolutionary heroes like Che Guevara—that attracted Montoneros
militants. Unlike those of the bookish high-left, the discourse and slogans of the Peronist
Left in the 1970s were particularly low, as exemplified by slogans such as: “The Peronist
Youth go out on the street and fight; and if they find a gorila,49 if they don’t shit on him,
they piss on him.”50
Completely at the other end of the high-low spectrum stood the very high,
“cultured,” Europe-centered, center-left socialist parties. They also worked within the
realm of constitutional principles.
The center continued to be divided into non- or anti-Peronist high, and Peronist
low. The high-center was occupied by different wings of the UCR. The UCR suffered
several divisions during this period, the most important of which was the 1957 split
between Arturo Frondizi’s Intransigent Radical Civic Union (Unión Cívica Radical
Intransigente, or UCRI) and Ricardo Balbín’s People’s Radical Civic Union (Unión
Cívica Radical del Pueblo, or UCRP). The UCRP, which eventually gained recognition
as the official UCR, positioned itself on the high-center during the Illia presidency
(1963–66) and then moved to a more center-right position under Balbín in the post-1966
period. The UCRI attempted to locate itself more to the low and somewhat to the left of
the UCRP, winning the 1958 presidential election with the support of many Peronist
 Ostiguy 29

voters. In 1963, the UCRI itself divided. The bulk of the party backed progressive
Buenos Aires governor Oscar Alende, transforming the UCRI—which would later evolve
into the PI (Partido Intransigente, or Intransigent Party)—into very-moderate-high, left-
of-center party. The rest of the party, led by Frondizi, formed the Movement of
Integration and Development (Movimiento de Integración y Desarrollo, or MID), which
moved to the right and, as the party appealing to nationalist industrialists, eventually
became an ally of the Peronists. In 1973, Alende ran as the leftist candidate of the Alianza
Popular Revolucionaria (Popular Revolutionary Alliance, or APR front with the new PI
at its core) and obtained 7.5% of the national vote. In that same election, Balbín, now sole
representative of the Radical identity, obtained 21.3% of the vote against Perón’s
candidate, Cámpora.
The low-center was occupied by mainstream Peronist factions, such as the “62
Organizations” union faction, which was led by metalworker leaders Augusto Vandor
and, after his assassination, Lorenzo Miguel. Although there was little programmatic
difference between the Illia government and the Vandorista (Vandorist) unions, the two
were markedly different on the high-low axis. Illia, a delicate, elderly politician who was
called “the Turtle” by his opponents, believed in proceduralism and the rule of law, and,
as a result, he never effectively engaged the country’s so-called “factors of power.” By
contrast, Vandor, Miguel, and other union bosses often flouted legal procedure, relying
instead on “face-to-face” relationships, back room negotiations, and no small amount of
intimidation.51 In the 1960s, orthodox Peronism opposed the radical Illia government. In
the 1970s, when Peronism came to occupy a very large portion of the Argentine political
space, orthodox Peronism and the Peronist left waged war with one another. Héctor
Cámpora, who was Perón’s delegate in Argentina and had the support of the leftist
Peronist Youth, obtained half of Argentina’s vote as the Peronist candidate. A few
months later, Perón himself, now just returned to Argentina, obtained an electoral victory
of unprecedented magnitude: 61.9% of the votes. He died one year later, after beginning
a move to destroy the low-left on which he had relied while in exile.
The high-low political differences were particularly wide on the right. The high-
right included conservative leaders such as Álvaro Alsogaray and Francisco Manrique,
economists such as Juan and Roberto Alemann, powerful socioeconomic actors such as
30 Ostiguy

the Rural Society and the Argentine Industrial Union, and top military leaders such as
Jorge Videla, head of the second bureaucratic-authoritarian regime. Alsogaray, a
landmark of the high-right, has founded, consecutively, four parties from 1957 to the
1980s; has had very close ties to the military, and was Argentina’s ambassador to the US
during the first bureaucratic-authoritarian regime. The ex-captain Manrique, minister of
social welfare during the first bureaucratic-authoritarian regime, obtained the highest
percentage of the vote ever received by the high-right: 15% in 1973.
The low-right, which was historically associated with the nationalist and catholic
right, included Peronist paramilitary groups such as the Comando de Organización (the
“Organization Commando”) and, in the 1960s and mid-1970s, arguably the Iron Guard.52
It also included “The Wizard” (“el brujo”) José López Rega, who became the main
figure behind the weak presidency of Isabel Perón after Juan Perón’s death in 1974.
López Rega, a former police chief who once said that “there is nothing like the Argentine
quebracho (tree) for hitting leftists over the head,”53 founded the Argentine Anti-
Communist Alliance (Alianza Anticomunista Argentina), which was responsible for the
killing of many leftists in the 1970s. The orthodox and the Lopezreguistas (supporters of
López Rega) allied during a time to eliminate the left (especially the Peronist left), but
differences then grew between the orthodox Miguel, on the very-low center, and López
Rega, far on the low-right.54
The armed forces were also divided along the high-low axis, with the more
nationalist wing (the Blues) earning the nickname of crudos (“crude”) and the more pro-
West, anti-Peronist, and bureaucratic wing (the Reds) receiving the nickname of cocidos
(“cooked”). Although both factions were right-wing and anti-communist, they clashed
repeatedly and even briefly entered into armed conflict in the early 1960s.

The Post-Transition Period and the 1980s.

The 1976–83 military dictatorship and the democratic transition that followed brought
important political and electoral novelties. The far left was decimated by repression, and
Peronism, weakened by both repression and the failure of its “collaborationist wing” to
distance itself from the military leadership, suffered its first ever electoral defeat in 1983.
The experience of the military dictatorship had a major political impact: in the 1980s,
 Ostiguy 31

people came to strongly value liberal democracy. Inversely, violence and paralegal deeds,
which had become the main form of political action in the 1970s, were severely
delegitimized because of the very negative dynamic they had produced. On regime
issues, the dictatorship therefore had very important consequences. But with regard to the
structuring of Argentina’s political space, including the names of “institutional” political
actors (whether parties or public figures) and their location in that space, the two
bureaucratic-authoritarian experiences produced very little change, as can be observed by
comparing Figure 5 and Figure 6.55 The much heralded appearance in the 1980s of a new
party on the high-right, led by Alsogaray and representing conservative business interests
in the political arena (Gibson 1990, 1996), was not new; it was Alsogaray’s fourth party.
Nor did it obtain vote totals superior in magnitude to those of the conservative Manrique
the previous decade. Similarly, the initial, relatively strong showing of Alende’s PI as a
third party, with around 6% of the vote in 1985, was also not novel, nor was its electoral
total superior to that obtained by Alende in the past. In fact, except for the shrinking of
the Peronist left, the maps of parties, actors, and positions in Argentina’s political space
in two different decades, in Figure 5 and Figure 6, appear almost indistinguishable from
one another.
The 1980s are a classic instance of the double political spectrum in its pure form.
The high-low framework is particularly important for the 1980s in that left-right
differences between the PJ under Cafiero and the UCR under Alfonsín were minimal, to
such an extent that they do not differentiate the two main parties. More importantly yet,
the most original, significant, and drastic political moves by key politicians in the 1980s
both to achieve victory over their internal adversaries and to change their party’s electoral
fortunes occurred precisely along the high-low dimension, as we shall shortly see.
 Ostiguy 33

In the 1980s, on the left and high of the high-low divide, there continued to be a
handful of small Marxist parties, the most important of which was the new Trotskyite
Movement to Socialism (Movimiento al Socialismo, or MAS). Although MAS made an
effort to organize in working-class zones such as greater Buenos Aires, its success was
limited, and it remained largely a party of intellectual cadres. The aging Socialists stood
as always on the very-high, left-of-center. The PI located itself, again as always, clearly
to the low of the Socialists, and more or less at the same point on the left-right axis. The
PI, Argentina’s third party throughout most of the 1980s, aimed at a mass base, claiming
to be “national-and-popular” (in contrast to the Socialists), but its electorate was
predominantly well-educated, young, middle to upper-middle class, and concentrated in
the capital. The PI program combined typical left proposals such as a moratorium on
foreign debt payments and the nationalization of the banks and foreign trade with more
“cultural-left” issues like ecology, citizen participation, and even bicycle lanes in Buenos
Aires. The very-low left had considerably shrunk, but it was still occupied by the ex-
Montoneros, which formed Intransigence and Mobilization, and later Revolutionary
Peronism. Left-of-center and on the moderate low, very close to the divide, the
informally written magazine Unidos (with “Chacho” Álvarez as an editor) stood out,
representing the left-wing of the Renovation faction. The PI’s profile can be starkly
contrasted to that of low-left General Labor Confederation leader Saúl Ubaldini, whose
sociocultural appeal was unambiguously popular. Though similar to higher left parties in
his opposition to International Monetary Fund policies and calls for socioeconomic
redistribution, Ubaldini’s socioeconomic discourse was informal and sentimental,56
focusing on the humildes. It was also localist and steeped with popular Catholicism,
including regular invocations of the Virgin Mary and Saint Cayetano (the patron saint of
labor).
The UCR and its different factions continued to be on the high center. Some
changes occurred, however. In the beginning of the 1980s and after the death of Balbín,
Raúl Alfonsín was able to win the leadership of the UCR, against the more old-fashioned
Línea histórica (the self-named Historical Line). Alfonsín’s faction, Renovación y
Cambio (Renovation and Change), aimed at making the UCR a modern mass party, with
the help of what became known in the 1980s as the Coordinadora (or roughly, the
34 Ostiguy

“Coordinating Organization”),57 dealing directly with the factors of power and

developing a mobilization capability.58 The low center continued to be occupied by a
variety of Peronist factions, including, as we shall see, the Renovators on the center-left
and very near the high-low divide, and—much lower—the so-called Orthodox leaders on
the center and center-right (Figure 6).
On the right, the UCeDe established itself on the very-high right, while Peronists
such as Triaca and, arguably, Herminio Iglesias stood quite low on the right. More on the
right, yet, were Rico and the Carapintadas (Painted Faces). The UCeDe, whose leader
Alsogaray had strong historical ties with military regimes, positioned itself as an “anti-
populist,” privatizing, economically liberal, free market party. It enjoyed the support of
much of the business community, and its electorate was concentrated in the wealthiest
neighborhoods of the Federal Capital. Despite efforts by one party leader, Adelina de
Viola,59 to “popularize” the party, the UCeDe generally maintained a high sociocultural
profile. Again, the “cooked” demeanor of many UCeDe leaders contrasted with the
macho, thug-like image of low right figures such as Herminio Iglesias and Aldo Rico. In
the 1980s, the Carapintadas were middle-ranking military officers (the leadership was at
the lieutenant colonel level within the Comando elite troops or special forces) who took
up arms against the so-called liberal, actually high-right, military command (Norden
1996: 107–135). They used ultranationalist rhetoric, were fiercely anti-US and anti-
Britain, and espoused a form of Catholic fundamentalism that included constant
invocations of the Virgin and the Fatherland. While the military command had
historically favored order and “social cleanliness,” the Carapintadas appealed to “guts,”
mystical fervor, blood, and nationalism. The Carapintadas became part of Menem’s vast
electoral campaign coalition and even offered to take up arms, if necessary, to defend a
Menem Peronist victory at the polls in 1989.60
It would be a highly erroneous conclusion, however, to believe that because the
Argentine political space remained structured, overall, as a double political spectrum, no
major, high-stake political positioning game occurred during that decade. The exact
opposite is true. And it is precisely as a tool for understanding the logic and stakes of the
major political strategies which unfolded that the double political spectrum framework—
 Ostiguy 35

and the high-low, left-right two dimensional space more generally—prove so useful as a
framework of analysis for Argentine politics.
The most important strategic political movements on the part of political actors in
the 1980s occurred along the high-low dimension. As summarized above, Alfonsín tried
to relocate the UCR more on the moderate-high, closer to the divide. He thus sought to
develop a mass movement capability for the UCR; stated that “with democracy, one can
eat”; dealt directly with the factors of power; and appealed to both middle- and working-
class sectors. He also tried to move the UCR to the center-left, linking it with social-
democracy. At the same time, the PJ lost two national elections: in 1983 and, with its
worst score, in 1985. Such defeats led to severe questioning on the part of many Peronist
leaders and strategists. The movement became even more disunited, both along the left-
right axis (a continued legacy of the 1970s) and increasingly along the high-low axis. In
the 1985 elections in the key province of Buenos Aires, Antonio Cafiero split from the
orthodox controlled, very-low, and right-of-center provincial PJ, and ran on a separate
ticket. His Frente Renovador (Renovation Front) won three times as many votes as the
orthodox Frente Justicialista de Liberación (Justicialist Liberation Front, or FREJULI)
led by Herminio Iglesias—even though it did come in a distant second to the UCR.61 This
victory of Cafiero over the team of Herminio Iglesias in 1985 launched with vigor the
movement to renovate the PJ, displaced the old guard of Peronism, and moved the image
of the party itself very clearly upward, eliminating the troublesome very-low. Locating
the party on the moderate-low made it more competitive facing the UCR. Thus, the
Renovadores (Renovators) distanced themselves from Peronism’s crude, ultra-plebeian,
at times ruffian, and also plebiscitarian traditions and cultivated a more “civilized,”
“professional,” procedurally-oriented, and liberal democratic image—which earned them
the nickname “suit and tie Peronism.”
By 1987, the Renovators were in full control of the party apparatus, and Cafiero
appeared almost certain to become Argentina’s next president in 1989. In 1987, under
Cafiero, the now united, modernized and renovated PJ, much nearer the divide on the
high-low axis as well as on the center-left, defeated the UCR by 41.5% of the vote to
37.3%. In line with Downsian logic, the party system had clearly converged toward the
center, especially on the high-low dimension, the central and most meaningful political
36 Ostiguy

dimension of Argentina. While Alfonsín at the beginning of the 1980s had made the UCR
more competitive with regard to Peronism, in the mid-to-late 1980s Cafiero had made the
PJ look much more like Alfonsinism. On the left-right axis, it could be argued that
Cafiero was also somewhat to the center-left of a centrist Alfonsín in the mid-to-late
1980s.
Despite those new strategic transformations in terms of political positioning on
the part of the parties’ leaderships, making each party more acceptable to the historical
social basis of the other, Peronism and radicalism maintained markedly different social
bases and sociocultural profiles. Whereas the UCR remained a predominantly middle-
class party, the PJ continued to draw its support primarily from the working and lower
classes (Ostiguy 1998). And despite the PJ Renovation’s recent “upward” shift, a wide
sociocultural gulf continued to separate the two parties. Backed by students, intellectuals,
and the educated middle classes in general, Alfonsín emphasized liberal-high issues such
as human rights, due process, and republican institutions. He also appointed a large
number of intellectuals to governmental positions. Attendance at Peronist rallies
continued to be by the same lower- and working-class crowd, despite Cafiero being
certainly less captivating for this audience than more typical Peronist orators. Therefore,
even though appeals matter, especially in strategic behavior, it is clear that followers
identify not only with leaders but with one another, as part of a movement. In the two
years between 1985 and 1987, the nature of the respective movements had not, yet, been
altered.
In the PJ, the Renovators not only coexisted with competitors on their lower flank
but were in fact ultimately defeated by them. In the first open primary of Peronism, in
1988, Carlos Menem, presenting himself as an outsider from a far-flung province, with
no support from the party apparatus, located himself very deliberately and credibly on the
very-low, to challenge Cafiero and his second, De la Sota, within the Peronist electorate.
He adopted a (credible) very lower-class and nativist image, toured the slums and remote
areas of the hinterland, had physical contact with the humildes (humble, poor people).
Against all odds, especially from an institutionalist standpoint, and surprising the serious
press, Menem defeated Cafiero. Although vague on policy matters, Menem’s
sociocultural position had been unmistakable. This was seen in his enormous sideburns
 Ostiguy 37

and traditional poncho, which he donned as the self-proclaimed reincarnation of

Sarmiento’s Facundo. Dressed in leather, Menem rode through impoverished
neighborhoods standing atop a garbage truck draped with Argentine flags. Mothers
swarmed the truck, lifting children to Menem for his blessing (Cerruti 1993: 241).
Invoking the Virgin and Perón, Menem asserted that he was putting “one ear on the heart
of the People and listening with the other to the voice of God” (Cerruti 1993: 236). For
many, Menem was an old-style caudillo from a backward province who appeared crude,
self-contradictory, irresponsible, and even circus-like. Menem in 1988 appalled “serious”
people on the high and, as “Carlitos,” enthralled Peronists on the low.
The mistake of Cafiero had been to already position himself against the Radicales
for the presidential elections of 1989, assuming that he could not really be challenged
from within Peronism, a “verticalist” movement, in light of the strong institutional hold
he had on the party apparatus at the time. While located for the electorate as a whole at a
median position on the high-low axis, he was off base for the average Peronist voter.
Cafiero also probably played “too high” in an effort to demonstrate the credibility of the
PJ’s new, higher position on political procedure, pluralism, and fairness of play. Menem,
on the other hand, was not encumbered by such considerations. He combined all the
“leftovers”: violent groups from the Peronist right and from the Peronist left; thug-like
orthodox Peronists; highly personalistic appeals; calls of redemption; etc.
The 1989 presidential campaign, between Carlos Menem on the very-low, and
perhaps right of center, and Eduardo Angeloz, clearly right-of-center and on the high,
displayed a spectacular and perhaps unprecedented gap on the high-low axis. This gap
was reflected in the widely different social bases of both candidates. Contemporary
analysts often forget that the hyperinflationary crisis broke loose after the PJ victory in
May, during the transition period under a particularly weak lame duck president.
Throughout his campaign in late 1988 and early 1989, Menem maintained a caudillistic
leadership style (manifested by his campaign slogan “Follow Me”); a nativistic and
nationalistic orientation (including vague references to taking back the Malvinas Islands
by force); and culturally popular demeanor, taste, and behavior. When the economic
crisis acquired significant proportions in the last month or so of the campaign, Menem’s
political campaign increasingly took on a populist, redemptive and even mystical quality,
38 Ostiguy

while Angeloz distanced himself from Alfonsín, locating himself clearly to the right
economically, and emphasizing seriousness and competence to reassure markets.
In contrast to Cafiero’s strategy, which fit the theory of convergence toward the
center, Menem drastically polarized the electorate in late 1988 and early 1989, locating
himself on the extreme-low.62 With high levels of mobilization, he defeated the Radicals
at the polls. After May 15, the economic and social crisis grew entirely out of control,
and it was clear that the future president (not scheduled to take over until December)
would have to take very drastic measures, of whatever kind.
The continued centrality of high-low differences in the 1980s can be seen in the
fact that alliances or defections across the Peronist/anti-Peronist cleavage remained
strikingly infrequent. Despite the fact that left-of-center Peronists like the Renovators had
more programmatic affinities with the Alfonsinista (Alfonsinist) Radicals and the PI than
with the right-wing sectors of orthodox Peronism, there were remarkably few instances of
PJ defections to (or close alliances with) these other progressive forces. Indeed, it was far
more common to see figures passing from the Marxian intellectual left to the UCR
government than to see public figures passing between the UCR (or, still less, the
cultured and “ethical” Socialists) and Peronism. In the same vein, even though the
UCeDe and the Peronist right both despised “subversives” and “social democrats,” it
would never have occurred to orthodox Peronists to align with the UCeDe against the
left-of-center tendency that gained control of the PJ in the late 1980s.

THE PARADOX OF MENEMISM: APPEALS, RECEPTION,

AND PARTY SYSTEM IN THE 1990s63

The double political spectrum helps to explain a major puzzle in contemporary Argentine
politics: working- and lower-class support for Menemism and middle-class opposition to
it. As is well-known, the Menem government implemented a set of neoliberal or
“Thatcherite” economic policies that ran directly counter to the traditional Peronist
program, and which appeared to place the PJ on the right of the party system. Yet
Peronism’s social and electoral bases remained solidly working class and lower class. At
the same time, the UCR and the emerging FREPASO positioned themselves to the left of
the PJ in the early and mid-1990s, opposing the bulk of the Menem government’s
 Ostiguy 39

neoliberal reforms. Yet both of these parties drew the bulk of their support from middle-
and upper-middle-class voters who, in many cases, most benefitted from the economic
reforms. Paradoxically, then, the popular sectors massively supported the right-wing
Menem government, while large sectors of the middle and upper- middle classes opposed
it.
This section argues that Menem was able to maintain his lower-class base
because, while he did indeed shift markedly to the right, his positioning with regard to the
high-low divide remained stable. Although parties such as FREPASO and the UCR
positioned themselves to the left of the PJ, their appeals were too on the high to capture a
substantial fraction of the traditional Peronist vote (see Figure 7). It also argues that
although left-right differences had an important impact on the party system in the early
1990s, FREPASO’s consolidation as a high-center party, followed by the formation of
the Alliance, showed that the high-low axis remained predominant in Argentine politics.

The Puzzle
A central paradox of Menemism is that the PJ enjoyed the massive support of the lower
sectors of society throughout the 1990s, despite the fact that these voters were the least
supportive of the Menem government’s neoliberal policies (Ostiguy 1998: 464–479). At
the same time, the bulk of the middle- and upper-middle-class electorate, much of which
backed the government’s economic policies, remained hostile to Menem and continually
voted against the PJ (Ostiguy 1998: 380–391; 471–479). Menem’s neoliberal policies and
alliance with big business, the UCeDe, and other historical enemies of Peronism led
many analysts to expect that the PJ would lose its working- and lower-class base in the
1990s. This did not happen, however. Although many traditional Peronist voters did
indeed oppose the Menem program,64 the PJ retained the massive support of the poor
(Ostiguy 1998).
The PJ’s continued lower-class support was not simply a product of a lack of
electoral alternatives. Several left-of-center PJ defectors competed for Peronist votes in
1991, including popular union leader Saúl Ubaldini (who ran for governor of Buenos
Aires province) and a group of eight PJ congressmen, known as the “Group of Eight,”
who left the party in 1990 in opposition to the government’s economic and human rights
40 Ostiguy

policies. Moreover, the UCR and left-of-center parties such as the PI and the Unidad
Socialista (the Socialist Unity alliance, or US) opposed the neoliberal model in the early
1990s. Indeed, Radical leader Raúl Alfonsín created the umbrella Movimiento para la
Democracia Social (Movement for Social Democracy, or MODESO) in 1992 in an
explicit attempt to win working-class votes. Yet all of these efforts failed to capture
working- and lower-class votes. Despite presenting themselves as “true Peronist”
alternatives, Ubaldini and, to a lesser extent, the Group of Eight each received barely two
percent of the vote in Buenos Aires; and the UCR, PI, and US all failed to expand beyond
their traditional middle-class bases.

The Menemist Electoral and Political Coalition

Much research has been expended on the reasons for the political success of policy
switches and neoliberal economic reforms of the type carried out by the Menem
administration in Argentina. These reasons cover a spectrum that ranges from a “strong
state” argument about technocratic insulation (e.g., Haggard and Kaufman 1992:18–37
and 332–350, and 1995:154–59); to the capabilities and effectiveness of a policy
network65 within the state and the governing coalition (Teichman 2001:15–22), combined
with the adaptability of the Peronist party organization and its shift toward clientelistic
practices (Levitsky 1998b, 2005); to a bifurcated base of social support pitting a
conservative hinterland against an urban working class (Gibson 1997); to actual bargains
made with the losers of the reforms (Etchemendy 2001; Murillo 2001 on Argentina after
1992); to the view that the problem is largely a false one, since representation is
retrospective in Latin America (Stokes 1999:100) and voters very much liked
neoliberalism once it was put into practice (Stokes 2001:138–42). These different
explanations, moreover, have been bound up with a range of widely divergent political
assumptions about the political cost of those neoliberal reforms, and therefore the levels
of opposition that they are bound to awake. Some have assumed that major obstacles
must be dealt with by a civilian administration in order to successfully carry out
unpopular reforms, especially if they attack the social basis of the governing coalition
(e.g., Waterbury 1989; Collier 1992: 136–41 and 156–61; Teichman 2001: 5–9; Murillo
2001). Others have assumed that the problem for an elected government is that of a
 Ostiguy 41

typical collective action problem, where the winners of neoliberal policies are diffuse and
the gains are long-term, while the losers are concentrated rent-seekers and their losses are
short-term (e.g., Bates 1992; Krueger 1993). Others, finally, assume that there are few
real obstacles apart from the need of politicians to dissimulate while seeking election
(Stokes 1999:104–08), or to realize cognitively, once in power, that “efficiency policies”
are best for the people (Stokes 2001:21 and 1999:126–27).
If one takes the perspective that neoliberal reforms carried out by elected
governments, and especially by a labor-based party, do face major obstacles to political
success, one can identify three general sources of political opposition that would need to
be surmounted: rent-seeking oligopolies benefitting from state protection and subsidies;
organized labor; and the electorate, especially if the segments affected belong to the
traditional basis of the party carrying out the reforms. Concerning the first, Schamis
(1999) has provided an empirically convincing analysis of why the top businesses that in
the 1980s formed in Argentina the group known as the Captains of Industry (Ostiguy
1990) actually stood to gain much from the neoliberal privatization program, despite the
fact that a significant portion of those Captains of Industry had been among the main
beneficiaries of the patria contratista (the ironically termed “contracting motherland”) as
rent-seeking oligopolies. Etchemendy (2001), while recognizing the autonomy of the
state’s initiative, extends this analysis in a rich empirical way to the tradable sector of the
economy and, most importantly, to organized labor. The paradox for me lies at the
electoral level.
The object of my contribution is thus specific and regards the issue of electoral
political support. A major problem with the use of the social scientific term “coalition,”
however, is that it is not clear what are the units forming a “coalition”—economic
interests, defined from a political-economy logic; organizations, such as trade unions;
sets of individuals, who are part of policy networks; regions, such as the hinterland;
social groups, such as classes or class fractions; types of voters? Each answer is quite
acceptable, but the various ways of identifying and characterizing coalitions are not
interchangeable and involve very different research methodologies. However, rather than
engaging in a debate about which unit of analysis is the most relevant or “best,” one can
perhaps—fully aware of their lack of interchangeability—regard these different
42 Ostiguy

approaches to analyzing “coalitions” as complementary to one another. In contrast to the

organizational approach which lends itself very well, epistemologically, to a coalitional
framework, in the case of voters, one can only speak metaphorically of “coalitions,” since
what is being combined in reality are either appeals—and sets of people responding to a
given appeal—or, less convincingly, whole sociologically defined groups of voters.66
How electoral political support for the PJ’s neoliberal reforms is maintained
becomes an especially puzzling question considering that, inverting the classic political
economy statements mentioned above, Menem’s reforms arguably had specific and short-
term winners (e.g., the captains of industry), and diffuse but real losers—especially his
own voters. The electoral sociological paradox stated in the previous section is thus in
sharp need of explanation. Certainly, machine politics, as richly described by Levitsky
(2003, 2001a, 2001b), did play an important material role, as it increasingly supplanted
trade unions as the main conveyor belt between Peronist leaderships and the Peronist
electorate. Without machine politics, even strongly held identities and political
preferences among the popular sectors may disappear.67 Still, unemployment and
underemployment, which struck mainly among the traditional Peronist base, steadily rose
to unprecedentedly high levels, from 13.9% in 1991 to 30.9% in May 1995,68 as a
product of the reforms. Peronism, however, remained entirely unchallenged throughout
the decade within the social sectors most affected by this scourge. Similarly, survey
analysis and my own interviews in the field show that a large majority of the lower-
sector Peronist electoral base did not like those economic reforms, and that it is among
that group that one finds the most negative attitude toward the new economic
orientation.69 If one differentiates by party identity, rather than socioeconomic level, 58%
of Peronists preferred the state to be the main regulator of economic activity—the highest
percentage by far of the three main families of party sympathizers—and only 39%
preferred free enterprise (Equas 31)70. In contrast, 55% of Radicals preferred free
enterprise and, of course, 75% of UCeDeistas did so. Peronists were thus the least
supportive of the new economic orientation. The vast majority, however, did repeatedly
vote for the PJ. Inversely, the middle sectors, where so many of the buyers through newly
possible and widespread credit cards and cuota systems (payment plans) could be found,
and where approval rates for the measures were much higher,71 by and large did not vote
 Ostiguy 43

for the leader who had made all those purchases possible. One must thus be very cautious
using highly aggregated data linking attitudes toward the economic model and voting
preferences, as the conclusions are subject to a severe ecological fallacy: though there
seems to be a correlation over time, most lower-sector Peronists did not like the
economic policies but voted for the PJ; middle- and upper-middle sectors were much
more favorable to the new economic orientation but voted for the PJ to a significantly
lesser degree than the popular sectors.72 My field interviews in the lower-sector areas of
the greater Buenos Aires aimed to elucidate the first of these two mirror “contradictions”
(Ostiguy 1998: ch. 6).
In Argentina, social-cultural identities (which include significant expressive and
normative components) are very important in the “economy of likes and dislikes.”
Moreover, especially within the popular sectors, political identities, and most
conspicuously Peronist identity, are a major phenomenon.73 This finding may perhaps
seem somewhat banal to scholars of political behavior, but it is surprising how little
attention it has received in comparative politics, including in discussions of economic
reforms, where the influence of political identities on voting tend to be dismissed as
“irrational.”74 Murillo (2001: 149–52 and 166–72), of course, has emphasized the
importance of party loyalty in Argentina in shaping the reaction of trade union leaders to
economic reforms that they did not necessarily approve or want. But in contrast to party
identities in the US, which have one of the two main parties as their object, the Peronist
identity in Argentina refers not only, and perhaps not even mainly, to the Peronist party.
Peronism is a collective social and political identity. The notion of movimiento need not
be understood only in organizational terms—i.e., in reference to the political party, the
trade unions, the guerrilla groups, the leader—but rather, more significantly and in a
fashion closer to that of “social” movement, as a collective, socially differentiated
identity oriented toward political, public action. With regard to Peronist identity, the best
heuristic analogy is perhaps that of being Catholic: one may not like the current Pope or
his policies, but that is not a reason to become Protestant. The logical outcome, in both
instances, is of course abstention and disaffection, not “switching.”
This disjuncture between the way people voted and what they thought regarding
economic policy suggests that the vote was not centrally a product of a socioeconomic
44 Ostiguy

calculation, but rather largely of a strong sociocultural and political identity (see Figure
7).75 Thus, the key to Menem’s electoral support among the poor was his capacity to
remain “Peronist.” Because Peronism is, first and foremost, a movement on the low, this
meant sustaining a low appeal. My analysis therefore takes the party system and societal
cleavages as a fundamental intervening variable within the Argentine polity between
preferences, for example on economic policies, and voting. This observation is in line
with a society where, as we have seen in this paper, a political divide between Peronism
and non–Peronism, and more broadly between high and low, is deeply anchored, carries
much historical baggage, and has an emotional charge.76

There is little question that, prior to 1989, Menem effectively embodied a

discourse and practices that were social-culturally very low. His political style, manners,
and ways of addressing and relating to “the people” (el pueblo) were “pure Peronism.”
He further developed this style by visiting people in their own low-income
neighborhoods with his “caravans of hope” and later standing on top of the Menemobil,
blessing objects given to him by poor people, and making gestures such as hugging his
heart. His culturally popular and messianic image had a strong resonance among the
poor; along the way, it also engendered popular trust in the persona of “Carlitos,” as well
as a corresponding distrust among the middle class.
Although Menem abandoned his—admittedly vague and often contradictory—
populist socioeconomic discourse after taking office in 1989, he did not abandon his
comparatively low sociocultural discourse and demeanor (though certain changes did
happen in this regard). Although he replaced the poncho with expensive suits,77 Menem
continued to use a language and demeanor recognizable to all Peronists. The Menem-led
PJ remained—much more so than the Renovadores in the late 1980s—solidly within the
Peronist “political culture” in terms of its language, its mode of doing politics, its
manners and its set of affective symbols. More generally, Menem’s appeal on the low,
through publicized sociocultural practices (such as playing soccer with “the boys” on
television or having manifest “success” with beautiful women) or socioculturally marked
political practices78 were in line with the very culture of Peronism, and continued to feed
a identification between the popular sectors and him. The very actions that so appalled
Ostiguy 45
46 Ostiguy

well-educated Argentines and led them consider Menem an “embarrassment” (speeding

down public highways in his new sports car, with police support; inviting super models
and other starlets to the presidential palace) were attractive to many (particularly male)
working- and lower-class voters.
Menem also took pains to frame his government project—socioculturally and
rhetorically—as distinctively Peronist. For example, in a famous speech to a 1991 party
congress in which he explained the neoliberal transformation to his (statist, class-
conscious, and nationalist) Peronist followers, Menem declared:
I come to this historic encounter of Justicialist militancy with a profound faith...
The National Justicialist Movement was born to change history, not to endure it.
[Argentina will] change through our courage, our braveness. Because to liberate
our country from backwardness is not a matter of becoming less Peronist, but of
becoming more Peronist....
I come here with no intention of speaking in worn-out words or using big
words. Or to display theories that have no heart or reason. Argentina is sick of
words. Argentina won’t be fixed by talk....And like the Perón of 1945, we have no
use for dogmatism, for preconceived models, or for ideologies....Today more than
ever we must be the anti-system. We need to enter an era of daring transgressions,
of truly revolutionary political practices... Is what I’m saying new, or didn’t the
General Perón express himself this way?
I believe in neither privatization nor statism. I believe in Argentinism. In
Argentinism with capital letters. I want to listen to the voice of the people, and
this is why I listen to it, because the voice of the people is the voice of God. With
the people, with God, and with our fatherland, to triumph, to triumph, to triumph!
(1991)

This speech was not about markets or economic policies, but about Peronism and
about being credibly on the low politically, including in vocabulary. In sum, if the
Menem-led PJ appealed to the socioeconomic right, it never abandoned the low space
that Peronism had occupied since the 1940s. Given that high-low differences remain the
predominant axis in politics, one could say that in a very important sense, Menem
remained solidly “Peronist.”79
The fact that the PJ remained solidly on the low had important electoral
consequences, for it meant that high parties would have difficulty capturing traditional
Peronist votes via socioeconomic appeals. Thus, Alfonsín’s Movement for Social
Democracy (MODESO), which made an explicitly socioeconomic appeal to the working
and lower classes, failed to take hold, as did the anti-neoliberal appeals of high left-of-
 Ostiguy 47

center parties such as the PI and the US. The salience of the high-low cleavage also helps
to explain the failure of the Group of Eight, which, though Peronist (on the very-
moderate low), was largely a group of middle-class intellectuals associated with the
magazine Unidos. Though lower than the UCR and the US, the Group of Eight was
nevertheless unable to combine its left-of-center socioeconomic message with a credible
appeal on the low. The only political force that made inroads among poor voters was
MODIN,80 which positioned itself on the extreme low. Founded in 1990 by Carapintada
leader Aldo Rico, MODIN was nationalist, nativist, and socioculturally low, as well as
anti-neoliberal. Rico cultivated an image as a strong male leader, at ease with guns, and
he demarcated himself in public for being crude, “macho,” and at times violent (such as
when he threw a rival out of a local party headquarters at gunpoint). Not surprisingly,
MODIN aligned with the PJ beginning in 1995.
The key to Menem’s political success, then, was his combination of dissimilar
appeals on the low and on the socioeconomic right (see Figure 7). He achieved this by
combining the popular appeal of Peronism as a historically popular and socio-culturally
low identity with the economic policies long demanded by an important sector of the
economic elite and the neoliberal right.81 The dualistic nature of this coalition was
reflected graphically in the large “Rally of the Yes,” on April 1990, which is described by
Cerruti (1993:331):
Early, on time, without organization or supervision, they arrived convoked by the
journalists. Entire upper-class families, liberal youth, students of private
universities, members of the most renowned clubs of Buenos Aires, businessmen,
bankers, ladies of high society. Dressed in the latest fashions, jewels, [and] hats,
many left the car parked a few blocks away from the Plaza. Late, as always, and
as if it was a human flood, the Peronists that were arriving from the Greater
Buenos Aires convoked by [Peronist unionist] Luis Barrionuevo came down from
the chartered buses. Each group occupied half of the Plaza. They did not talk to
each other, they did not chant, they looked at each other with mistrust.

Survey and electoral data demonstrate the socially bifurcated nature of the
Menemist political coalition, especially in Capital. Historically, the PJ vote has always
varied inversely with income and education levels. Contrary to what several scholars
have asserted, this did not change substantially under Menem, except in 1992–93 and
only in Capital, when a “U-shaped” type of support occurred (Ostiguy 1998: 357–369).
48 Ostiguy

What did change, therefore, was that the PJ—temporarily—incorporated a significant

fraction of the upper-sector vote. Between 1990 and 1994, the overall slope was
accordingly less steep than in the past.82 But throughout the 1990s, support for the PJ was
as always strongest among the poorest and least educated voters (Ostiguy 1998). The
upper-sector voters, who migrated from the UCeDe and some conservative provincial
parties, were essentially high-right and privileged the economic right’s effective reforms
over the “propriety” and “decency” of the high.83 In this sense and temporarily,
Menemism electorally straddled, in a creative way, the high-low cleavage. To be sure,
supporting Harvard-trained economist Domingo Cavallo, the government’s economic
policy and “Menemism” despite Peronism, is not the same thing as supporting Peronism,
“our political movement”, the party of Perón and Evita, despite a lack of enthusiasm for
the new economic and foreign orientation.84 Two important caveats should thus be noted
about high-right support for Menem.85 First, it was only of significant electoral
consequence in wealthy urban centers, such as the Federal Capital. In the poorer districts
of Greater Buenos Aires and peripheral provinces such as Jujuy and Salta, the upper-
sector vote never constituted an important part of the PJ’s electoral base. Second, the
high-right/low coalition was short-lived. After 1995, most upper-sector voters defected to
high parties such as the Alliance and Domingo Cavallo’s Acción por la República, or
Action for the Republic. In the second half of the 1990s, Domingo Cavallo, until then
largely a technocrat of the type described by O’Donnell (1973) and associated with the
economic right and the US, launched himself in electoral politics, mainly in Capital and
as the architect of the neoliberal reforms, taking up the space—with his successive
political parties—previously occupied by the now defunct UCeDe.86

The Anti-Peronist Electoral and Political Coalition Reshaped

Paradoxically, it was the anti-Peronist bloc, rather than the Peronist bloc, that was most
dramatically transformed during the 1990s as a product of the neoliberal reforms and
Menemism. The crisis of the UCR following 1989 and the party’s 1994 decision to make
a pact with Menem to reform the constitution weakened the institutional hold of the UCR
over the high centrist position it had traditionally controlled. From 1994 to 1997, the
 Ostiguy 49

FREPASO competed for that space—a challenge that threatened to reduce the century-
old UCR to political insignificance.
This outcome was indeed highly paradoxical: the nucleus of the FREPASO was a
left-of-center group that split off from Peronism in 1991, the Group of Eight. Under the
leadership of Peronist deputy and Unidos editor “Chacho” Álvarez, the Group of Eight
left the Peronist block in opposition to Menem’s absolution of the convicted Generals of
the dictatorship and to his sharp neoliberal turn. Instead of the traditional high-low
division of Argentine politics, a left-right reorganization of the political field and party
system thus became a real historical possibility. As a product of a careful construction of
a series of political alliances with other forces, the Group of Eight gave way in 1993 to
the Frente Grande (Broad Front, or FG). Had the Frente Grande consolidated itself in a
position left of the center (on the left-right axis), but in the center or on the moderate-low
of the high-low divide, it might have produced clear a realignment of Argentine politics,
making the left-right division the primary political divide.
Yet despite its left-of-center Peronist origins, the Frente Grande, which was to
give birth to the FREPASO at the end of 1994, neither “normalized” the party system
along left-right lines (Abal Medina 1995) nor bridged the high-low divide. The history of
this serious attempt to constitute a “transversal” alliance to transform the party system,
although somewhat tortuous, ended up conforming and confirming a very clear pattern.
The first move in this sequence was by the more moderate Peronist deputies of the Group
of Eight, led by “Chacho” Álvarez, who crossed the high-low divide and joined forces
with “Democracia Popular,” or “Popular Democracy,” a short-lived group that united
members of the human rights movement, such as Graciela Fernandez Meijide and Aníbal
Ibarra (both from Capital), and the fraction of the Christian Democracy also linked with
human rights, led by Carlos Auyero (see Appendix). Together, they created the Frente
por la Democracia y la Justicia Social (Front for Democracy and Social Justice, or
FREDEJUSO). Sectors of the PI, located on the moderate-high and left-of-center, also
joined it. Contrary to the expectations of its members, the FREDEJUSO performed very
badly in the first national election that followed Menem’s turn-around, in 1991. This
debacle convinced Álvarez that they could not win at the polls with a “true Peronist”
50 Ostiguy

appeal, which they had in that election, combined with a left-of-center (and high-of-
center) appeal.
For the 1992 election for senator in Capital, a different, this time more leftist,
“transversal” alliance performed better, reaping 7.8% of the votes. This Front of the
South was led by a movie director involved in the Peronist left during the 1970s, “Pino”
Solanas, in alliance with the Communist Party and the more leftist Peronist deputies of
the Group of Eight (Appendix). The Front of the South received the support of the
FREDEJUSO.
In May 1993, these two “transversal” forces and their respective leaders,
“Chacho” Álvarez and “Pino” Solanas, created the Frente Grande, left of center. A very
specific location within the double political spectrum had thus been unified and occupied
institutionally: the Communist Party, the PI, human rights militants, and left-, as well as
left-of-center, Peronists on the moderate-low (see Figure 6 for the spatial location of
these specific forces; see Appendix for the institutional construction in that space). In
theory, the Frente Grande combined a leftist and a “true Peronist” opposition to
Menemism and its “economic and social model.” That united institutional space
performed very well electorally in Capital in the October 1993 national elections for
deputy, achieving 13.7% of the vote and transforming itself in the third political force of
Capital, ahead of Socialist Unity. In more ways than one, the Frente Grande now
occupied, both in terms of political position and electoral pull, the space of the PI in the
1980s (Figure 6). It also received its electoral support mainly among the middle sectors.
After 1992, Álvarez, Auyero, and Meijide increasingly “centered their critiques on the
subordination of Congress by the Executive, the efforts to reform the constitution simply
to allow Menem’s reelection, and the degradation of political life by corruption” (Novaro
and Palermo 1998:92). “Chacho” Álvarez stated publicly that he was not Peronist
anymore and that his purpose was not to build a new Peronist Renovation.
In November 1993, the Radicales, under Alfonsín, signed the Olivos Pact with
Menem’s PJ, in order to reform the constitution under specific terms.87 Elections for a
Constituent Assembly were thus scheduled for April 1994. In this setting, the Frente
Grande constituted itself as the main opposition to Menem’s PJ, the UCR having its
hands partly tied by the Pact. During those months, the FG moved further and further to
 Ostiguy 51

the high, having established a clean break with the Peronist tradition; it also started to
moderate its leftist opposition to the economic model. The FG thus clearly shifted its
attack on Menemism from socioeconomic to ethical grounds. The FG appeal centered
mostly on corruption, as seen in the party’s campaign slogan: “Constitution without
Mafias.” The Frente Grande’s appeal was based on republicanism and political
liberalism, that is, respect for the division of powers, judicial independence, and clean
government. It also included public education. These were issues of serious concern to
the (typically high) middle and upper-middle classes, but which—according to surveys—
were of less interest to the poor (who were and are concerned about concretely “getting
things done” and favor politicians they feel close to and can see in person). Even the FG’s
socioeconomic discourse involved increasingly moral appeals, rather than hailing the
poor themselves. FG leaders referred to the poor in the third person—in sharp contrast to
Peronist first-person-plural hailings—or as a symptom of the unhealthy situation created
by neoliberalism. Figure 7 illustrates how the FREPASO “coalition” was based on the
combination of a high sociocultural appeal (ethics, civic republicanism, institutional
integrity) and—albeit decreasingly—a left-of-center socioeconomic appeal. The electoral
result was impressive. The FG became the first electoral force in Capital, with 38% of the
vote, and, most importantly, established itself as a national force, with 12.7% of the
votes. Its strength, however, was still very unevenly distributed nationally, as it was
completely absent, for example, in the poorer and less developed Northwest (see Figure
7).
The year 1994 saw a major transformation in the Argentine party system. The
Frente Grande became established solidly on the high, originally on a left-of-center
position (1993). From there, however, it gradually but very clearly shifted toward the
center of the left-right spectrum, increasingly squeezing the UCR out of the position it
had historically occupied. Economic stability and privatizations had now also been
incorporated in its repertoire. The clear movement of the FG away from the left alienated
Solanas and the forces that had constituted the Front of the South, in the process. With
the gap widening with rising Álvarez, Solanas left the FG to form the more leftist
Alliance of the South, reoccupying the political space that had been left empty by the
Frente Grande’s continuous move toward the center of the left-right spectrum. The media
52 Ostiguy

came to characterize the Frente Grande as favoring a “clean version” of the economic
model and as concerned mainly with “ethical” issues. Novaro and Palermo (1998)
accurately describes the Frente Grande’s (and later the FREPASO’s) discourse and
political appeals as mainly centered around “republican values,” an Argentine replica of
the French discourse of the same name, generally used against right-wing populist
demagogues. The family of issues threaded together under that rubric is: respect for the
institutional mediations and checks and balances of the Republic (what O’Donnell calls
“horizontal accountability”), prevention of abuse of power; the rule of law and equality in
front of the law, without impunity; transparency of governmental actions; civic rights and
the fostering of a civic morality; political pluralism and public discussions of issues; i.e.,
overall and in brief, a defense of the institutions of the Republic and their independence,
against personalism (see Novaro and Palermo 1998: 91, 96, 122, 127, 134) Needless to
say, this republican discourse is clearly on the high, in the political-cultural
subdimension. Added to this, the most important leading figures of the FG, such as
Graciela Fernández Meijide and Aníbal Ibarra, were also distinctly high in their manners
and political styles. The success of the FG within the more educated segments of the
urban middle class was thus immense, having now also taken over the space occupied a
decade before, around 1983, by Alfonsinism. 88
Under the leadership of Álvarez, this oppositional FG continued in 1994 its
process of institutional expansion and unification. In August 1994, in another—this time
more centrist—effort at effecting a “transversal” rupture of the party system, a highly
mediatized meeting took place at the Café Molinos between Álvarez (FG), Federico
Storani (or the progressive, moderate-low faction of the UCR –Figure 6), and Octavio
Bordón, the Peronist governor and then senator for Mendoza, located on the very-
moderate low, on the center of the left-right spectrum. By the end of the year, Storani had
decided to remain in the UCR, challenging the official candidate of the UCR for the
presidential nomination. However, a major institutional development was the defection of
Bordón from the PJ, forming a group called Política Abierta para la Integridad Social
(Open Policy for Social Integrity, or more significantly PAIS, or “country”). In
December 1994, the FREPASO was born, encompassing in a single party the Frente
 Ostiguy 53

Grande, Bordón’s PAIS, and the one remaining significant force on the (very-) high-left,
the Socialist Unity (Figures 6 and 8; Appendix).
An open primary quickly took place between Álvarez (on the high, still somewhat
left of center) and Bordón, in a centrist position in both dimensions. Contrary to
expectations and to what an institutional perspective would have led us to predict,89
Bordón won those primaries and therefore became the presidential candidate of the
FREPASO, which had now taken over the Frente Grande. The victory of Bordón over
Álvarez in the February 1995 presidential primaries completed this shift away from the
left. By the 1995 presidential election, the FREPASO had thus completely dropped its
opposition to the core elements of the neoliberal model (including privatization, trade
liberalization, and the Convertibility Plan) and focused almost all of its attention on
public mores, clean and ethical government, civil liberties, respect for republican
institutions and the division of power: it was now an ex-radical civic union. Bordón,
Menem’s main political adversary in the race, obtained 29.2% of the votes, well before
the UCR’s candidate, Horacio Massaccesi, who came a distant third with 17% of the
vote. In the vote for deputies, which is less centered on personalities, the UCR and the
FREPASO were neck to neck at the national level, with each around 21% of the vote.
Figure 8 summarizes the above discussion by presenting the Argentine political
map in a dynamic fashion for the early to mid-1990s. It shows the evolution of what
became the FREPASO from the Peronist center-left (Group of Eight) in 1990, to the high
center-left (FG) in 1993; and then, along the high, toward the center on the left-right axis
(FREPASO) in 1994–95.
The high center-left, high center strategy was thus enormously successful. The
FG/FREPASO increased its vote share from four percent in 1993 to 30 percent in the
1995 presidential election, and it became the dominant political force in Federal Capital.
This success was clearly made possible by the party’s high-center appeal. The party’s
vote was concentrated in wealthy urban centers, particularly Federal Capital. It is well
known that the capital is socioculturally distinct from much of the rest of the country. It
has significantly higher levels of wealth and education, less caudillismo, and a more
cosmopolitan orientation. Indeed, Capital has often been accused of being
“Europeanizing,” of not being “truly Argentine,” and, most of all, of being snobbish
54 Ostiguy

toward the (more “folksy”) rest of the country. Moreover, survey and electoral data show
that the FG/FREPASO performed best in middle- and upper-middle-class neighborhoods
(and worst in the slums), and that support for the party was particularly high among those
with the highest level of education.90 This means that in socioeconomic and educational
terms, FREPASO’s electoral base was very similar to the high-center UCR (e.g.,
Alfonsinism). Rather than crosscutting the high-low divide, then, FREPASO ended up
reinforcing it.
Figure 8 also shows the very-low position of MODIN, which did successfully
capture traditional Peronist votes, in contrast to the US or the FG, which did not. Despite
Menem’s clear positioning on the right, the PJ remained quite heterogeneous. It included
Ubaldini on the low center-left,91 old guard union leader Lorenzo Miguel and Buenos
Aires governor Eduardo Duhalde in the low center, and newer leaders such as Alberto
Pierri and Santa Fe governor Carlos Reutemann on the center-right.
56 Ostiguy

BACK TO THE PAST:

THE PARTY SYSTEM IN THE LATE 1990s

If the high-low cleavage had shown some signs of breaking down in the early 1990s, by
the end of the decade it had reasserted itself with full vigor. In October 1995, Meijide was
elected senator for Capital with a strong 46% of the vote. Elections were then scheduled
in Capital for June 1996 to elect the Capital’s intendant, or chief of covernment.92 Bordón
wanted to nibble at the Peronist coalition by having Gustavo Beliz, a Peronist clearly
right of center but on the very-moderate low (Figure 8), run for the FREPASO. The
FREPASO, however, had previously agreed internally to have the socialist La Porta,
clearly left of center and very-high, run for this office. The euclidian political distance
between the two potential candidates was thus very large. Not surprisingly, severe
tensions arose. The militants of the Frente Grande and the Socialist Unity in the
FREPASO clearly sided with La Porta, with the backing of Meijide, also on the high
center-left. Bordón thus became isolated within the FREPASO, and slammed the door,
never to come back.93 Bordón had been correct, however: La Porta, on the very-high left,
was positioned too far from the center of even Capital’s political space. La Porta lost the
Capital’s election to the eternal rival of Alfonsín within the UCR, the also very-high but
center/center-right Radical de la Rúa. It was the first positive political news, and
comeback, for the UCR in the 1990s.
The sharp lesson from the 1995 presidential election was that a divided
opposition—the UCR and the FREPASO—was the best way to ensure the continuity of
the PJ in power. In contrast to Mexico, where the Partido Acción Nacional (National
Action Party, or PAN) and the Partido de la Revolución Democrática (Party of the
Democratic Revolution, or PRD) stood quite far apart on the left-right axis, arguably one
on either side of the PRI, the FREPASO and the UCR, as we have seen, were occupying
almost the same political space in 1996 (Figure 9)—or at least, significantly overlapped.
For the 1997 national elections for deputies, the UCR and FREPASO did the only
rational thing: they joined their organizations and ran together under the banner of the
Alianza. The effort paid off: for the first time since 1989, Menem’s PJ lost the elections.
The Alianza therefore set its sights on the 1999 presidential elections.
 Ostiguy 57

As in 1995, when Bordón and Álvarez joined forces, an open primary was
necessary to decide from which of these two now major political parties, the UCR and the
FREPASO, the leader of the Alianza, and therefore Argentina’s likely next president,
would come. The primaries were set for November 1998: the FREPASO backed Graciela
Meijide, and the UCR, Fernando de la Rúa. Both candidates were very much on the high,
but Meijide still had a left-of-center image, while de la Rúa was clearly right of center.
Actually, while the key figure of Alfonsín was inside the area of political overlap
between the UCR and FREPASO, de la Rúa was outside of it, on the right (Figures 8 and
9). With 64% of the vote, the Radical de la Rúa won an overwhelming victory over the
Frepasista Meijide. As in 1995, a candidate of the high center-left had difficulty imposing
herself in an open primary as the presidential candidate. While many had been
forecasting the disappearance of the UCR at the hands of the FREPASO in a struggle for
the same “share” of political space, the UCR was now back in strength, as the senior
partner of the coalition most likely to win the presidency. Paradoxically, the FREPASO,
which had begun left of center as the FG (and even as left-of-center Peronists) and had
been in clear opposition to the right represented by Menemism, was now the junior
partner of a coalition supporting a high-right presidential candidate!
In the meantime, a deadly struggle for the PJ presidential candidacy developed
between Menem and Duhalde. Legally, Menem was barred by the Constitution he
himself had negotiated from running for a third consecutive presidential term. As a
leading candidate on the low, however, such “legal niceties” were not a major
impediment for Menem (as they certainly were not at the time for Fujimori in Peru). For
the PJ, the major party on the low, primaries, which must be accompanied by
proceduralism and the rule of law, are only one political option among many for settling
political differences. Much as had occurred in the 1970s, but without the violence, severe
political infighting took place within Peronism to settle the issue. Politically, Duhalde
was more of a centrist and “classical” Peronist, thus spatially to the left of right-wing
Menem. After much difficulty and very late in the game, Duhalde, weakened by the
internal conflict, became the PJ’s presidential candidate. The PJ was thus led by a centrist
politician on the low.
 Ostiguy 59

A highly paradoxical situation therefore developed for the 1999 presidential

elections. While high-low differences were now particularly wide, de la Rúa’s
socioeconomic platform now placed him somewhat to the right of the Peronist Duhalde,
who had emerged as a critic of the neoliberal model (Figure 9). But overall, the Alliance
and PJ differed little on socioeconomic issues. The left-right partisan differences, which
were real in the early 1990s and had created a diagonal, high-left versus low-right, axis
of political conflict, had again largely disappeared in the 1999 presidential elections.
However, a very wide gap—not unlike that between Menem and Angeloz ten
years earlier in 1989—separated Duhalde and de la Rúa on the high-low axis. Duhalde
had risen within Peronism through his success in the impoverished second belt of the
Greater Buenos Aires, where particularly rough political methods prevail, physical
intimidation is common, and where he had built a strong political machine (see Levitsky
2003). Duhalde had the image of a plain “man of the people,” at ease culturally with
workers and poor people. De la Rúa, a man of Capital, was very restrained and proper in
his demeanor, thought of himself as “boring” (in contrast to Menem), believed in the
legitimacy of the law, and had the image of an “effete,” on the very high.
All major parties differentiated themselves in the 1999 presidential elections
primarily along the high-low divide in politics. The Alliance and Cavallo’s Action for the
Republic adopted classically high profiles. Alliance campaign posters called “For a
serious country: Enough of Menem,” while Cavallo’s quoted Sarmiento. The Alliance
promised an “ethical shock,” and Alliance vice presidential candidate Chacho Álvarez
declared that the Alliance sought to “adopt the institutional norms of the First World.”94
Duhalde, by contrast, maintained a profile much more on the low, aligning with the ultra-
low Aldo Rico and campaigning against portenos95 who “treat us like Indians.”96
Because of its composition, the new Alliance coalition thus became a broad left-
right coalition of the high. Peronist politicians were therefore quick to compare the
Alliance to the Democratic Union of 1946 (see the inside part of the circle in Figure 4).
Much like the Democratic Union, the Alliance included left-of-center social-democrats
(such as the Socialists and many FG militants), centrist radicals, and conservative
provincial parties. And what united these political forces, as in 1946, was a
socioculturally high profile, a politico-culturally high discourse (about institutions,
60 Ostiguy

norms, civic public life, the Republic), and a predominantly middle- and upper-middle-
class base. On the low, Peronism continued to have significant left-right differences, as
well.
In sum, Argentine politics appears to have gone full circle during the 1990s. A
Peronist left opposition to Menem gradually moved to the high left, and then to the high
center. With the formation of the Alliance and the election of the high center-right de la
Rúa, anti-Peronism again then shifted to the right of (post-Menemist) Peronism (Figure
9). The situation was in many ways comparable to that depicted in Figure 6 (the 1980s),
except that the center of gravity of the space had shifted somewhat to the right. The
Alliance maintained roughly the same profile as the combination of the UCR, the PI, and
the Socialists in the 1980s (Figure 6). Cavallo’s Action for the Republic replaced the
UCeDe on the high right. The PJ remained heterogeneous, although its left wing,
represented by politicians such as Santa Cruz governor Nestor Kirchner and unions such
as the—lower—Movimiento de Trabajadores Argentinos (Argentine Workers Movement,
or MTA), was weaker in 2001. Throughout the 1990s, the high-low dimension remained
the main divide of political conflict. Not only that, but this divide remained, and remains,
associated with socially differentiated, or “class-based,” political preferences.
 Ostiguy 61

POSTSCRIPT: ARGENTINA’S STRUCTURED POLITICAL

SPACE IN THE 2000s

1999–2002
History of course does not stop, and since the first versions of this paper in 2000–02, the
economy, under de la Rúa and his neoliberal economic ministers, melted down—strongly
affecting the party system, but not the structured political space—but also recovered in
the following years. A new cycle of efforts at transforming the party system, within a
context of severe delegitimization of politicians, began in 2003. As yet another tribute to
the robustness of the double political spectrum, the structure of the Argentine political
space remains intact, despite what are otherwise earth-shattering phenomena and
transformations.
Between 1991 and 2001, the “rotation” described above in the main axis of
political conflict, not unlike the rotation described for the 1940s regarding both the high
and the low, continued moving clockwise. President de la Rúa first chose a moderate
economist (linked to Alfonsinism) as his minister of economy. He then replaced him with
an ultra-orthodox neoliberal economist, also from the Radical party but obviously on its
right: Ricardo López Murphy. López Murphy was a graduate in economics from
Chicago, had advised Angeloz (Figure 6), and was a consultant for the powerful and
conservative Fundación de Investigaciones Económicas Latinoamericanas (Foundation
for Latin American Economic Research, or FIEL). With the economy driven more and
more into recession under orthodox fiscal policies, de la Rúa then appointed as his
minister of economy a figure outside of the Alliance and to its right: the “eternal”
Domingo Cavallo! Cavallo, as is well known, had been Menem’s main minister of
economy and the architect of the neoliberal reforms and economic stabilization. In the
1999 presidential elections, Cavallo had run as the leader of the high right party he had
just founded—Action for the Republic—receiving a total of 10% of the national vote. By
2000, it seemed that whatever the political force in power, Cavallo always ended up
minister of economy. Indeed, Cavallo has now been a top civil servant for the three main
historical political actors of Argentina: the military under the B-A regime, in 1981; the
Peronists, under Menem; and the Radicales, under de la Rúa. But like the UCeDe, he had,
62 Ostiguy

of course, never been able to win a large fraction of the vote on his own or based on his—
very clear—programmatic position.
With the tandems de la Rúa-López Murphy and then de la Rúa-Cavallo standing
for orthodox neoliberalism and big business, and with cases of corruption not being dealt
with firmly by the president, a situation clearly similar to that of the early 1990s
developed. And indeed, dissatisfaction predictably grew within the left of the Alliance.
The emptied political space on the high left, created by the notable move of the
Alliance’s leader to the right, was in due time in the 2000s filled by a new organizational
actor, called Alternativa para una República de Iguales (Argentina for a Republic of
Equals, or ARI). This new party was manned mainly by left-dissidents of the FREPASO,
especially from the ex-Frente Grande and the Socialist Parties. Its leader, however, was a
then little-known progressive radical, Elisa Carrió, who broke from the voting block of
the Alianza in Congress on ethical and anti-corruption issues. She joined forces with the
very-high-left socialist Alfredo Bravo. ARI was somewhat vague on economic programs
(although it definitely claims to be “progressive”) and, like the FG in 1994, had its clear
trademark in anti-corruption and ethical—”high”—issues. It was in fact a combination of
the moderate-high and very-high center-left, just like in 1993–94 (Figure 10).
64 Ostiguy

The clockwise movement of the main axis of conflict, as expected, was not
limited to the high but simultaneously occurred on the low (just as it had in the 1940s).
After de la Rúa resigned at the end of 2001, power was transferred to Peronism, on the
other side of the divide. And Peronism chose as the new president of the country Adolfo
Rodríguez Saá. Rodríguez Saá, in contrast to his predecessors, adopted a nationalist,
left—and to some, demagogical—discourse, and attempted to act as a strong man. One of
his first measures was to have Argentina default on its large foreign debt (something
Cavallo had attempted to avoid at absolutely all costs), which he did with nationalist
pride. While Menem had led the PJ clearly from the right during the entire 1990s, the PJ
now became led, even if briefly, from the nationalist left. Some skeptical Peronist
deputies disparagingly compared Rodríguez Saá to Hugo Chávez. Argentine politics had
therefore gone an entire, full circle from 1988–89, with Menem defeating Angeloz (on
the high-right), to 2001, with Rodríguez Saá replacing de la Rúa (on the high-right). The
high-low divide, however, had remained intact. An alliance between the forces of
Rodríguez Saá and the ARI, both clearly left of center, was as unthinkable as, in 1945, an
alliance between Perón’s Laborists and the Socialists. And indeed, Rodríguez Saá came
to ally, instead, with Aldo Rico on the low. Needless to say, the ARI came to be very
popular among the middle sectors, while Rodríguez Saá was then very popular among the
popular sectors.
De la Rúa’s years in government were odd in many ways. He faced his most
important political opposition from the left of his own Alliance. On the other hand, he
received support from actors who were not part of his party or coalition: most clearly
Cavallo, but also, behind the scenes, from Menem, on Peronism’s right. Writing an
earlier version of this text in 2003, I predicted that no doubt analysts would then forecast
for the current decade the creation of significant “transversal” alliances and the radical
transformation of Argentina’s political space (basically along the left-right axis)—a
change which occurred no more in this current decade than it did in the wake of similar
developments in the early 1990s, in the late 1950s with Frondizismo or, with regard to
high and low in politics, in the mid-1940s.
On the low and to the left of Peronism, a new political actor, called the Social
Pole, also emerged (Figure 10). It proved, however, very difficult to build any bridges
 Ostiguy 65

between the Social Pole and ARI, both left of center. ARI clearly stood for civic
republicanism, a certain kind of protest, the struggle against corruption, as well as
“progressivism,” whereas the Social Pole was concerned “in the first person” with the
social plight of the poor, as was Ubaldini in the 1980s. Their electorates are
correspondingly very different.
Like a decade before in the case of the Frente Grande, Elisa Carrió built bridges in
2002 with leaders of the “pure left,” on the high of the divide, such as, this time, Luis
Zamora, an ex-Trotskyite bookseller and human rights lawyer (instead of the Communist
Party and Graciela Fernandez Meijide, as in 1992–93). As in the mid-1990s, there was
also a certain overlap, politically, between the ARI and the progressive wing of the
Radicales. Carrió herself was a Radical deputy from the Chaco, before the UCR joined
the Alianza. Although the FREPASO and, one decade later, the ARI, both focus heavily
on republican issues, they have also each been associated with a given tandem of public
figures: the duo Bravo-Carrió took over the duo Álvarez-Meijide.
De la Rúa, as incapable of mastering the economy in times of crisis as was his
Radical predecessor Alfonsín twelve years before, resigned at the end of December 2001,
after a series of riots. After the short-lived Peronist presidency of Rodríguez Saá,
Eduardo Duhalde, the loser of the 1999 presidential elections but nonetheless a central
and weighty figure within Peronism, became president of Argentina. With de la Rúa
eliminated, Alfonsín also again became the central figure of the UCR and, as he had done
with Menem in 1994, gave Duhalde his political support, invoking the country’s stability
(also reflecting his awareness of the UCR’s very weak electoral position).

2002–200597
Between December 2001 and early 2003, Argentina made world headlines with the
collapse of the government of President Fernando de la Rúa, the rapid succession of three
presidents,98 the bankruptcy of the banking system and the state’s fiscal crisis, the
widespread rejection of the political class with the slogan “Get Rid of Them All,” the
waves of protest and the explosion of social movements, associations, and protest
movements, distant from the state and critical not only of neoliberalism but of the
monetized market economy as well. This crisis, the worst of which lasted about two
66 Ostiguy

years, was however perhaps just as remarkable as the illusion of drastic change perceived
by numerous analysts. Besides the immediacy of the banking and employment situation,
there had been a strong disillusionment from many engendered by Menemist Peronism
and, as significantly, by the failure of the long process of construction of an institutional
opposition led by the FREPASO, which had resulted in the formation of the Alianza, in
De la Rúa’s presidency, and finally in a resounding economic, political, and ethical
collapse, thus exhausting all possible political alternatives within the party system. The
logical result was the rejection of the political class altogether.
In 2002 and 2003, however, in a context of weakened popularity of politicians
and under the aegis of Peronist interim president Eduardo Duhalde and of his Minister of
Economy Roberto Lavagna, the state’s coffers were replenished little by little, order was
slowly reestablished, and the oppositional social movements were treated with a
combination of repression and cooptation. One cannot overemphasize the abnormality of
the urgent situation that had erupted under De la Rúa and that was then subsequently and
slowly diffused during the interim presidency of Duhalde (himself a very pragmatic man,
a sort of “Peronist puntero”99 on a grand scale).
In a beautiful way in terms of this paper, as a hotly contested game was going on
in late 2002 within Peronism to decide who was going to lead the PJ when Duhalde
would come to the end of his interim presidency, every one of the four corners of the
Peronist political space had a contending candidate: Kirchner was running on the high-
left of Peronism; de la Sota on the high-right of Peronism; Rodríguez Saá on the low-
”left”; and Menem was attempting a comeback, on the low-right (see also Figure 10 and,
for 2003, Figure 11). The future leader of the PJ was unquestionably going to be
Argentina’s next president.
Figure 11 illustrates the fortuitous or, rather, unplanned circumstances100 that
moved the entire Peronist movement leftward, with Kirchner. Duhalde, between 1998
and 2004, was Peronism’s strong man—though he was himself not running in the
upcoming elections. He was located approximately in the center of the Peronist political
space. His first choice for the presidential candidacy was Governor Carlos Reutemann, a
center-right Peronist. This ex-Formula One champion, who had become the Peronist
governor of Santa Fe and entered politics under Menem’s wing, declined. Duhalde then
 Ostiguy 67

set his sights on Juan Manuel de la Sota, governor of Cordoba and also right of center.
But de la Sota was too much on the high for Peronism and, on economic issues, not very
different from Menem; his campaign in any case failed to take off. It was only as a third
choice that Duhalde threw his weight behind Néstor Kirchner, governor of Santa Cruz, in
the hopes of thwarting the inexhaustible ambitions of Carlos Menem.
To crown this analysis, surveys showed that Rodríguez Saá (on the low left-of-
center) and Menem (on the low right) both received greatest political support from the
poorest and less educated lower-sector voters. Kirchner (on the moderate-low, left-of-
center) and de la Sota (on the center of the high-low divide, right-of-center) were more
popular among middle social sectors. Congruent with this framework, Rodríguez Saá
made an alliance with Aldo Rico, on the very-low, and Hugo Moyano, a teamster on the
very-low center-left (Figure 10). Pierri (Figure 8), on the low right, fittingly gave his
support to Menem.

At first glance, the crisis of 2001–03 could be interpreted as having led to the
fragmentation or implosion of the Argentine party system.101 Witness the unheard-of fact
that in the April 2003 presidential elections, five candidates, three of whom were
Peronists, ran simultaneously, all independently of one another.102 The Argentine party
system has historically been characterized as bipartisan,103 but in the 2003 elections the
UCR candidate was not among the pack of five.104 There were, moreover, not one but
three Peronist candidates, Carlos Menem, Néstor Kirchner, and Adolfo Rodríguez Saá,
all conducting ruthless presidential campaigns with autonomous organizations, with
alliances between Peronist and non-Peronist candidates theoretically as possible as
between Peronist candidates.
However—and fundamentally—the two-dimensional Argentine political space
remained spectacularly unchanged. It even displayed a remarkable continuity, as was also
the case before and after the military dictatorships of 1976–83 and 1966–73, and before
and after the hyper-inflationary crisis of 1989 with Menem’s swerve to the right. In fact,
if the Argentine bipartisan system has fragmented or imploded, it is within an especially
stable two-dimensional political space. Positions in the two-dimensional Argentine
political space are in fact far more stable than the partisan institutions themselves, which
68 Ostiguy

come and go. A position that is abandoned within this two-dimensional space leads, after
a few years, to the creation of a new partisan actor to fill that political void.105
Figure 11 represents the position of the five main candidates in the April 2003
presidential elections, with three Peronists (Rodríguez Saá, Menem, and Kirchner), and
two non-Peronists (López Murphy and Carrió). Menem and Rodríguez Saá are the most
on the low, with Menem clearly to the right of Rodríguez Saá. Carrió and López Murphy,
both of Radical origin, are the most on the high. Carrió, moreover, also established her
distinctive mark, like the FREPASO of 1994–95 before her, as being on the “high” on
questions of ethics, transparency, and respect for the law. Carrió was then situated
relatively to the left, having experienced her period of greatest growth while allied with
the socialist Alfredo Bravo. As for Lopez Murphy, he sought to represent a serious and
decent neoliberal right (corresponding to a certain image of developed countries), fully
respecting the separation of powers, the smooth functioning of republican institutions,
and the rule of law, in contrast to the shenanigans, extravagance, and populism of
Menem. Kirchner was then the only presidential candidate to straddle the political
cleavage between the high and low in Argentina—something that has definitely changed
since. Although a Peronist, like his center-right Peronist colleague De la Sota, he was
then arguably situated on the moderate high. From the moderate-high and the center-left,
he was then in an excellent position to attract the progressive and urban middle-class
republican vote, as he partially did in 2003 and especially in 2005. The competition that
originally pitted the Peronist Kirchner against the non-Peronist Carrió in 2003 for this
same educated, center-left, and middle-class electorate was unavoidable but short lived.
On the left-right axis, López Murphy and Menem clearly represented the right.
López Murphy was perceived as a gorila106 by the Peronists, while Menem was ever
more linked to the popular conservatism of the country’s interior or hinterland. Kirchner
and Carrió, meanwhile, were left of the center. The latter, far to the high, attracted then a
non-Peronist progressive vote. As for Rodríguez Saá, he remained difficult to classify
along the left-right axis in 2003; emphasizing the “national and popular,” he placed
himself very low in the Peronist tradition.
70 Ostiguy

With this very high number of five viable presidential candidates, each attempting
to differentiate himself as much as possible from the others, the center of the two-
dimensional political space remained notably vacant. Figure 11 allows us to visualize a
circle formed by the five candidates at the outer perimeter of the two-dimensional space,
with each one accenting his uniqueness.107 Somewhat in the center of the Peronist space
we find Duhalde, who indeed played the role of kingmaker in the presidential race among
the Peronist candidates. This situation is thus the exact opposite of that in the 1980s,
where the two principal political forces converged on the center of the two-dimensional
space, under the leadership of the Peronist Cafiero and the Radical Alfonsín.
With these respective positions, illustrated in Figure 11, the logical possibilities of
alliances in 2003 were numerous, particularly in prevision of a second round: a
(neoliberal) right-wing alliance between López Murphy and Menem, against Kirchner,
Carrió, and implicitly Rodriguez Saá; or an alliance of the low between Rodríguez Saá
and Menem, against the non-Peronists. It is this latter alliance that became a reality, in
May 2005, with the Frente Popular, even though Rodriguez Saá had clearly attacked
Menem from the left in 2003. Menem and Saá even publicly accused Kirchner of not
being Peronist, a charge that could not be taken lightly. Inversely, there existed the
possibility of an alliance on the high between Carrió and López Murphy, which would
have echoed the political experience of the Alianza, between “Chacho” Alvarez and De la
Rúa from 1997 to 2000.
In late 2002, somewhere shortly before the first round, some polls put Menem and
López Murphy in the lead. According to other polls, Carrió and Rodriguez Saá were in
the lead (Cheresky 2004a: 46-47). Either way, this would have occasioned a purely high-
low (and not left-right) second round, as in the 1999 presidential elections between
Duhalde and De la Rúa. However, the 2003 finalists turned out to be Menem and
Kirchner, in a second round that was in contrast entirely left-right, but within the Peronist
movement. Carrió rallied to Kirchner, and Rodriguez Saá implicitly did the same despite
a strong campaign of seduction undertaken by Menem, while López Murphy remained
neutral (Figure 11).108
The greater the euclidian spatial distance between two candidates or forces, the
more unlikely the alliance. This was the case between the ARI (Alternative for a
 Ostiguy 71

Republic of Equals) and Menemism. One was also hard-pressed to imagine the Peronist
left allying with López Murphy. On the high-right, there was then not enough room,
despite their entirely different partisan origins, for López Murphy (Recrear), Domingo
Cavallo with his ex-Acción por la República, and the defunct UCeDe.
For the legislative elections of October 2005, the major development was the
rupture between Duhalde and his 2003 protégé, Kirchner.109 Between 2003 and 2004, the
latter had gradually consolidated power within Peronism and with the governors.
Duhalde, on the other hand, had always sought to reign in Kirchner’s “leftist” leanings. In
2005, Kirchner and Duhalde presented two separate and opposite tickets, and fought a
bitter political battle vicariously through their wives, who were running against one
another for senator in the important province of Buenos Aires. As expected, there was
consequently neither a full rupture within Peronism nor a reconciliation, but rather a
power relationship that reflected the electoral results of October.

Kirchner did not redefine Peronism, he simply represents one tendency of it,110 a
tendency until recently clearly in control (under Kirchner) of the—somewhat
“verticalist”—Peronist movement. In the same way this left-wing tendency was
completely marginalized in the 1990s, rightwing Peronism was then also temporarily
relatively marginalized. The traditional Peronism “of the center,” as represented by
Duhalde or before by metallurgic union official Lorenzo Miguel, always stands in a
difficult balancing position: it is regarded as necessary when one of these right or left
tendencies is building up power, and then shunned as that tendency attempts to
consolidate itself in power (but never achieves it). Peronism is a dynamic movement, and
its vitality lies precisely in the tension between tendencies, which are always seeking to
become hegemonic but are regularly set back by the reversal of a given ideological
model, electoral fortune, economic limitations, and the difficulties of re-reelections.
Finally, on the anti-Peronist side, important lessons and similarities emerge from
the striking comparison between the 1990s (Figure 10) and the 2000s. In 2003, the ARI,
on the left and of Radical origin, occupied the same space that the FREPASO occupied in
the 1990s. They also then appealed to a similar electorate. The FG first sought to create a
“transversal” coalition on the left, but then shifted as we saw towards the high left, in
72 Ostiguy

order to include it. Having lost its potential low Peronist voters, the FREPASO, on the
high and in a period of rapid growth, gradually moved toward the high center, on a direct
collision course with the UCR, which had always occupied this space. After the 1995
presidential election where they competed in part for the same voters, the FREPASO and
the UCR came to the inevitable conclusion to form the Alianza. In the mid-2000s, ARI,
under Carrió, also moved from left of center to the center (and some even argue the
center-right), provoking in the process the desertion of several ARI leaders, and also
increased its profile on the high, creating in 2007 the Coalición Cívica (Civic Coalition,
or CC). The CC is difficult to pin down on the left-right axis, but stands very much on the
high. With the rebirth of the Radical Civic Union (under Gerardo Morales), a Civic
party,111 which is as “civic” as the Civic Coalition, once again a spatial collision was
inevitable. This has lead, once more, to the creation, this time not of an “Alianza” but of
an Acuerdo Civico y Social (Social and Civic Agreement, or AcyS), in an almost
fastidious repetition of history. In the meantime, and as always, the pendulum is again (in
2009) threatening to swing, once more, between the left and the right and center of the
Peronist movement. Is there a certain “compulsion to repeat,” out of a spatial and
cleavage dynamic?

CONCLUSION

This paper has shown how Argentina’s political dynamic and political space is structured
as a two-dimensional political space, and most particularly as a double political spectrum.
In the process, it has also shown how the Peronism/anti-Peronism political cleavage has a
meaning that extends beyond, and indeed crosscuts, programmatic or policy differences.
While governing in Argentina is something that indeed occur along the left-right axis,
whether one looks at the 1990s or the late 2000s, electoral appeals and elections in
Argentina function to a large extent around the iron law of the high-low dimension, a
reflection of Argentina’s society, history, political culture, and recurring problems—what
one would call a cleavage. Argentina is a particularly telling case in that it demonstrates
that social differences can be translated and politicized along a much different axis than
the classical left-right axis. And it also shows that contrary to what is often asserted, such
 Ostiguy 73

sociocultural and political-cultural differences remain quite relevant in politics—perhaps

even more than when they are politicized along the left-right axis.
The paper also helps to explain Peronism itself. Peronism has long confounded
political analysts because, while socially it is significantly class-based, it has stubbornly
resisted political classification in left-right terms. Although it is by now clear that the
movement contains both left and right wing elements, Peronism is still systematically
different politically from the opposition it triggers. What has always distinguished
Peronism from its opponents is the fact that it stands politically on the low, in terms of
both dimensions of the high-low axis. It is for this reason that Peronism and anti-
Peronism have repeatedly leapfrogged each other on the left-right axis, without this
fundamentally altering the party system. In many ways, moreover, Peronism creates anti-
Peronism—and historically, vice-versa as well.
A political repositioning toward the low on the part of the traditional non- or anti-
Peronist forces in Argentina to the extent required to transform such a structured political
space remains very improbable for the time being. Such a repositioning would, moreover,
be quite antithetical to what they think they stand for politically, in terms of their
principles. Similarly, a transformation of the double political spectrum would require that
Peronism and its leaders position themselves markedly on the high, in the process risking
alienating their traditional electorate and losing the bonds that have kept alive loyalty,
triggered passion, and fostered hope (thus risking losing “Peronism’s soul”).112 A
disastrous economic performance can be lethal to the institutional life of a political actor,
but even in such instances one is much less likely to witness a reordering of the political
space in Argentina than, as has already happened many times, the eventual birth of new
institutional actors that move into the void left by the fallen one, thus keeping alive and
feeding upon certain traditions, principles, attachments or, perhaps most importantly,
sensitivities.
 Ostiguy 75

ENDNOTES

1
See for example the first-rate empirical work of Canton, either alone (1973: 149–156; 1986) or
with Jorrat (1978: 148–154; 1998: 149–156; 2007).
2
I demonstrate this fact in my book manuscript through a logit regression based on survey data.
Results display a remarkable significance level (!), under .0005.
3
While Di Tella emphasizes that “Peronist” parties are “populist workers’ parties” and not social
democratic or labor parties, and more specifically that “Peronismo [is] a workers’ party…[that is]
not social democratic” (1994: 262–63; see also, 1990: 149), in all of his writings from those of
1965 through those of the 1980s and then the 1990s, and even in 2003, Peronism is always
characterized as on the verge of transforming itself into a labor or social-democratic party (1965:
72, 74; 1984: 265; 1998: 216, 217, 219–20). Peronism is also characterized as the local
equivalent, in a less developed setting, of the Labor Party or as “occup[ying] a position akin to
that of the Communists [in Italy]” (1990:155). In the 1960s, Di Tella forecasted the departure of
the anti-status-quo elite minority from the populist movement and a greater reliance of the party
on its trade union base. He described Peronism as, then, “developing a tendency to assume the
shape of a labor movement...closer into line with European working-class tradition...This type
gives way to a Labor version as found in fully industrialized societies” (1965: 72, 74). In the
1990s, under neoliberal Menem, Di Tella foresaw that “a division of Peronism might take place...
and a left-wing coalition might [thus] have…a Peronist faction appealing to ‘national popular’
traditions…[and] modern trade unionists [supporting] the statement that Peronism is a forerunner
of social democracy” (1998: 219–20). Untiringly, Di Tella repeated the same forecast in 2002
(“Una ruptura irreversible,” Clarín, 3 November 2002, p.16) and, again, in 2003 (presentation at
the 39th Colloquium of the Instituto para el desarrollo empresarial de la Argentina, Buenos Aires,
6 November 2003).
The structural and, to a certain extent, intuitive view of Peronism as left-of-center relies
on its electoral source of support and mobilization, which clearly lies among the popular sectors,
and on its clear organizational links with the unions. A very influential perspective in the US
sharing some political and intellectual affinity to that of Di Tella is that of Collier and Collier
(1991), where a key feature of Peronism is the organizational links established between the
populist party that incorporated labor and the unions. Their definition of populism also “draws
heavily on the widely cited discussion of di Tella” (Collier and Collier 1991: 788).
4
While Jose Luis Romero was unequivocal about what he clearly considered a fascist regime in
1946, for Tulio Halperín, Perón undoubtedly attempted to establish a fascist regime but failed in
76 Ostiguy

his enterprise. Closer to the events, back in 1956, Halperín wrote that Peronism was born “de una
tentativa fascista” (of a fascist attempt) and that “fascism was the system of reference out of
which Perón had formed his political ideology” before 1943, but that the founder of Peronism
“elaborated what we could call...a fascism of the possible, finding the maximum dose of fascism
that post-war Argentina was in a condition to withstand” (1995 [1956]: 53–54). The founder of
the social sciences in Argentina, Gino Germani (e.g., 1978) also compared the mobilizational
experience of Peronism not so much with social democracy, like the later Di Tella, but with the
mobilizational experience of Mussolini’s fascism (which he had lived), while highlighting
differences between the two.
5
The term “fascism” has unfortunately become synonymous in the last decades with right-wing,
authoritarian, militaristic, and repressive regimes or movements. An accurate understanding of
fascism, historically and conceptually, is not compatible with the demobilizational, atomizing,
foreignizing, repressive, and often neoliberal political regimes of Pinochet, Videla, or the
Uruguayan juntas, quite independently of the severe normative condemnation that both rightly
deserve.
6
Seymour Martin Lipset also wrote, intriguingly but not without logic: “If Peronism is
considered a variant of fascism, then it is a fascism of the left because it is based on the social
strata who would otherwise turn to socialism or Communism as an outlet for their [claims] and
frustrations” (1981: 176). Following this train of thought, he therefore considers Peronism a
peculiar form of “left” extremism, or non-liberal left (127, 129).
7
For example the mass-distributed Manual del Peronista (The Peronist Manual) clearly states:
“Our social doctrine is the social-christian doctrine” (Partido Peronista 1948: 70 and 27).
Moreover, one of the well-known “Twenty Truths of Peronism,” or core statements of what
Peronism is about, is that “justicialism is a new life philosophy: simple, practical, popular,
profoundly Christian and humanist.” The popular educative magazine, Mundo Peronista, also
emphasized the tight relationship between Christianity and the Peronist Doctrine (Mundo
Peronista 24 [1952]).
In brief, all official documents circulated by Perón and his party among the Peronist base
for mass indoctrination stressed the social-Christian or Christian nature of Peronism’s social
doctrine. They also stressed that Peronism was a “third position” between the evils of liberal
individualism and those of collectivism.
8
As recently as 1998, T. Di Tella wrote in a newspaper column: “The strange thing is that the
Peronists think they are Christian-Democrats, and indeed they have joined this international. And
 Ostiguy 77

the Radicals think they are Social-Democrats, and they have also joined the respective world
organization. But what people think has little to do with what they are.” (Translation by the
author, Clarín, 18 October 1998).
9
Personal communication by T. Halperín, 1995. The influential commentator Mariano Grondona
also used the same political characterization to describe Menem’s Peronism, which he compared
to that of the conservative caudillos of the 1940s in the Province of Buenos Aires (La Nación, 28
September 1997). Subsequently, the popular magazine Noticias also adopted the term for
Menem’s Peronism (e.g., 28 July 2001).
10
There are many instances of Perón’s praise of Che Guevara. In Carta de Perón al movimiento
peronista con motivo de la muerte del ‘Che’ Guevara (Letter from Perón to the Peronist
movement about Che Guevara’s death), for example, Perón writes: “His death tears my soul apart
because he was one of ours, perhaps the best....I have read some wires that pretend to present him
as an enemy of Peronism. Nothing more absurd.... [His death is] an irreparable loss for the cause
of people who fight for their liberation. Peronism, as a national, popular, revolutionary movement
pays an emotional homage to the idealist, the revolutionary, the Comandante Ernesto ‘Che’
Guevara, the Argentine guerilla fighter who died in action taking up arms in pursuit of the
triumph of national revolutions in Latin America” (translation by the author, Baschetti 1988:
273–74).
11
In Spanish: “Este Chinito quien me roba las ideas.” More formally, Perón expressed a deep
political affinity with Mao’s project, in one of his most famous books, writing: “The bold attitude
of the Great Mao has divided with clarity national socialism from the international socialism that
gave rise to Soviet imperialism. ...For us, those of the third position, ...the refusal of Mao to side
with colonialism...lays the foundation of the ‘Third World’ in which the different socialist
democracies can get along perfectly...There is no reason for nationalism and socialism to quarrel.
Both ...can unite with the common objective of liberating the pueblos [(the various people)]”
(Perón, in La Hora de los Pueblos 1987 [1968]: 142–43).
12
Many analysts of Argentine politics, such as Cheresky (2007) and Cheresky and Pousadela
(2004) for example, have quite plausibly argued that the Argentine party system has imploded
since 2001. Whether accurate or not (and certainly, many new parties and actors have emerged,
while others have vanished or dramatically shrunk), the argument does not invalidate in any way
our characterization about the spatial location and political affinities (and antagonism) of political
forces or actors in Argentina. In fact, it remarkably strengthens it.
13
See for example Ostiguy (1990: 324–332, incl. f.n. 26).
78 Ostiguy

14
One of the few key public figures who has remained consistent on that left-right axis is
Domingo Cavallo, on the right, who has sequentially served in key economic positions under the
military, the Peronists, and the Alianza led by a Radical president.
15
One should make clear that the low in politics is not limited to Peronism, although it is by far
its main component. In the 1990s, for example, the MODIN of Aldo Rico was clearly on the low.
It did oppose the economic model of Carlos Menem, but an alliance with the FREPASO would
have been unthinkable. Not surprisingly, it eventually joined the Peronism of Duhalde, also on
the low center.
16
On the concept and definition of cleavage, see the now classic work of Bartolini and Mair
(1990).
17
The very first rough draft of this long paper was written in 2000.
18
This short section inevitably borrows from Ostiguy (2009). These two Kellogg working papers
should normally be read together, as they form a series.
19
One could also say "well-mannered" or "well-bred," regarding demeanor, in the sense of "bien
educado" in Spanish or "bien élevé" in French.
20
It is important to emphasize that these are claims, repeatedly made in the political arena, rather
than observations of actual behavior along those lines. They are, in other words, types of appeals
and ways of presenting oneself to the public. Of course, to be credible it helps that there be a
relation between those claims and actual practices, or that there be at least no overt contradiction.
21
Perceptions of immediacy have important implications with respect to establishing relations
with “regular” people (la gente) or “the people” (el pueblo). Personalism can also be seen as
warmer and easier to relate to.
22
Svampa (1994) offers a review of the vicissitudes of this topic through Argentine political and
intellectual history. See also Shumway (1991) on the nineteenth century.
23
See also De la Fuente (2000) for a historically well-researched book on that topic, especially
page 78 and 86–89. In a previous work (Ostiguy 2007: 93–94), in the section “The ‘Dreaded
Alliance’: The Montoneras,” I describe the montoneras as hordes of Federal horsemen, made up
of unkempt, rough, unruly, and generally lower-class gauchos with lances, fighting under the
leadership of a caudillo in an uneven battle against the centralizing Unitarios.
24
See Sarmiento’s well-known book, Facundo: Civilización y barbarie, translated into English in
the nineteenth century as Life in the Argentine Republic in the Days of the Tyrants; or,
Civilization and Barbarism (1974 [1868]), chapters 1 and 2.
 Ostiguy 79

25
Perón was preceded in that role, in the script of the oligarchic elite, by Hipólito Yrigoyen, the
leader of the Radicales in the first third of the century. The animosity towards Yrigoyen and the
explicit comparison with Rosas, however, was never as strong. Peron’s rule, indeed, was the
“second,” and not the “third,” tyranny. See Svampa (1994) and Ostiguy (1998).
26
See Ostiguy (2007: 105), however, for the chain of equivalence that was created at the cultural-
symbolic level.
27
The purpose of the present paper is not to develop a methodology designed to measure
positions on the high-low scale with quantitative precision. Such a task is both desirable and
feasible, being equivalent in objectives to the methods developed for measuring programmatic
positions on the left-right scale (e.g., Budge, Robertson, and Hearl 1987 or Heath, Evans, and
Martin 1994). It is, however, appropriately the object of a separate article.
28
During the first Perón government, Borges wrote a short story in slang, entitled "The Feast of
the Monster” (1994 [1947]) which depicted an uncultured, lower-sector bus driver on his way to
the Peronist founding event of October 17. Later, in "L’illusion comique," a well known piece
published in the highbrow literary magazine Sur (1955), he described the Perón period as “years
of opprobrium and foolery...made up of stupidity or gross ignorance and of fairy-tales for the
consumption of boors and bumpkins."
29
The point here is not that Peronist leaders are just like the Federal caudillos of the nineteenth
century. Rather, Peronist leaders and their followers often refer to caudillismo as a form of
legitimation and as a model (with clear roots in Argentina) for a particular type of political
practice and representation.
30
A well-known case of patoterismo in the 1990s was that of "Batata” ("Sweet Potato"—a
nickname he picked up while working at the central market carrying cases of yams), who was
involved in beating up a journalist for researching "what he was not supposed to research.”
31
Quoted in Cerruti (1993:155).
32
The Carapintadas, or literally “Painted Faces,” were a radical right-wing nationalist military
group within the Argentine Armed Forces during the 1980s, mainly known for staging three
military uprisings against the democratically elected Alfonsín Radical government, particularly in
opposition to the human rights trials then going on. They claimed to want to preserve the dignity
of the Armed Forces. Their ideology was nationalist and on the Catholic far-right. Particularly
“virile,” they claimed to be into combat and heroism. The best book on the topic is arguably
Norden (1996).
80 Ostiguy

33
It is important to highlight that in Argentina, the pejorative term “los negros” does not refer to
people of African origins, with black skin, but to poorer and generally less educated people with
somewhat darker skin and black hair, usually partly mestizo. It is not clear, furthermore, if the
category is a racial one (i.e., someone not entirely white) or, as I would perhaps be more inclined
to think, a social one. Both elements are present.
34
In the mid 1990s, the MODIN was absorbed, however (and not too surprisingly) by the
Peronism of Duhalde. On the Iron Guard and the Commando of Organization, see endnote 46
below.
35
On the “inordinate fear of communism” on the part of a certain—nationalist—fraction of the
elite in Argentina at the time, see Waisman (1987: chapters 6 and 7).
36
On that topic, from a perspective highly sympathetic to popular culture, see the excellent work
of James (1988, 1995).
37
Perón’s internal opponents within the military, responding to the pressure from the growing
opposition movement, sought an immediate return to civilian, liberal democratic rule, without any
military continuity.
38
Speech by Perón on the night of 17 October 1945, reproduced in Britos (1984: 192–194) and in
many other sources.
39
The two subdimensions of left and right, analyzed in details in Ostiguy (2009: 11–16), here
become extremely relevant. In terms of economics and distribution, Perón could absolutely not,
as the ordinary working class well understood, be considered on the right. He thus shared a
position with the leftist political parties, in the opposite camp. The other dimension of left and
right, about authority-and-order in public decision-making, remained present, but had somewhat
faded in the two years from 1943 to 1945.
40
See, for example, the national newspaper La Razón, 7 November 1945, p. 8.
41
Doctor G. Topolevsky and Frugoni Zabala, national delegates for the UCR, quoted in La
Razón, 5 November 1945.
42
The many cartoons published during that precise period in La Hora and in La Vanguardia are
particularly vivid and extreme in that regard.
43
In his first electoral rally, Perón declared: “we will not call anybody rabble or shirtless...We will
have a good solid heart under a shirt, which is better than having a bad heart under a coat.”
Nonetheless, during the applause after Perón’s speech, someone handed him a flagpole with a
shirt tied to it as a flag. Perón was then photographed waving it, an image circulated nationally by
 Ostiguy 81

the opposition press. From then on, the shirt(less) would be a Peronist symbol. (Speech
reproduced in Luna (1969: 432).)
44
The theoretical relation between the two parts of Figure 2 could, a priori, logically be
understood in an “uncommitted,” tri-dimensional way: the bottom part of Figure 2 would thus be
pictured as a third dimension, of depth, in relation to the (already two-dimensional) top part of
Figure 2. Thus, here, all combinations between the two parts of the figure would be logically
possible a priori. However, in a much more ambitious way and as done in this section, we believe
(as elaborated and justified elsewhere) that the two parts of Figure 2 can be superimposed in a
graphically simple (and “flat”) two-dimensional way, creating a figure the shape of a wheel. We
are thus making here an empirical and specifically theoretical statement about the ordering of the
divides in relation to one another. In this way, the poles of all subdimensions are thus not entirely
neutral with regard to each other—even though high-low and left-right, as a whole, are.
45
The military coup that overthrew the Perón government and thus marked the end of the ten-
year old Peronist regime called itself the “Libertadora,” or “liberating revolution.” The name is a
very partial denomination that nonetheless reflected the spirit and interpretation of the anti-
Peronist side of the divide, for whom Peronism had been a period of marked authoritarian rule,
associated by some to fascism. The name has stayed with us to the present.
46
I qualify these governments as semi-democratic because of the official electoral ban on
Peronism.
47
In the paintings of Carpani, for example, workers with massive bodies and unkempt gauchos
charging on horses with lances gave an emancipatory bodily character to “barbarism.”
48
The ERP even renamed a sugar plantation they occupied in the interior "Ho Chi Minh."
49
Gorila is a Peronist term used to describe virulent anti-Peronists. Coined in the aftermath of the
1955 coup against Perón, the term has come to refer to anyone who feels aversion, or at least
dislike, for the masses and especially the lower sectors.
50
“La juventud peronista sale a la calle y pelea y si se encuentra un gorila si no lo caga lo mea.”
Personal collection of Peronist cantos, most of which (including this one) were taken from the
Peronist historical archive of archivist Roberto Baschetti, at the Biblioteca Nacional.
51
For example, as McGuire (1997: 98) writes, Augusto Vandor “organized gangs of street toughs
who stifled dissent in exchange for a meal, a few drinks, and a night of camaraderie.”
52
While the location of Brito Lima’s Comando de Organización far on the Peronist right is
unproblematic and part of a consensus, many militants of the Guardia de Hierro (Iron Guard)
would clearly take issue to be located on the right. They viewed themselves as a militarized, ultra-
82 Ostiguy

orthodox Peronist organization, against any type of challenges within Peronism to the authority of
the leader, Perón. In the 1970s, such challenges within Peronism came from the Peronist left, thus
the strong left-“right” antagonism between the Montoneros and Guardia de Hierro. In the 1960s,
however, Guardia de Hierro, opposed Vandor and supported Rucci for the same reason, that is,
the undisputed leadership of the leader, and here the issue was not a left-right one. I somewhat
controversially locate Guardia de Hierro on the Peronist right in that its motivation is absolute
allegiance to the national leader and not working-class union claims or “liberation or
dependency” or “the pueblo peronista.” (See, for example, Pozzi and Cerviño, n.d.) Labels here
are confusing: while the Rumanian Iron Guard was clearly proto-fascist, it is actually the
Comando de Organizacion (and not the Argentine Iron Guard) that is very strongly and explicitly
anti-Semitic. The Comando de Orgazación was also close to Lopez Rega and the Argentine Anti-
Communist Alliance.
53
Quebracho is a native species of hardwood that grows in the northern hinterland of Argentina.
54
The orthodox then won the confrontation, forcing the ousting of López Rega. The orthodox, on
the very-low center-right, then confronted Italo Luder, also on the center but much more on the
high within Peronism, in the last months before the coup, with the former opposing any form of
party institutionalization (McGuire 1997:168–69). McGuire makes it clear that “the cleavage
between verticalists [Miguel, “the parrot”] and antiverticalists [Luder; Victorio Calabro] did not
correspond directly to a rivalry between unionists and politicians” (ibid).
55
This situation stands in sharp contrast to that of Brazil, for example. This shows how deeply
rooted in society and history are the political divisions of Argentina. Party institutionalization, of
course, is a different matter. The observation made here is about the durability of the given
structure of a political space, as well as, secondarily, the continuity over time of major political
parties, movements, or set of parties (such as the socialist parties in Argentina). On the concept of
party institutionalization in Latin America, see Levitsky (1998a, 2001a, 2003).
56
This style was so pronounced that Alfonsín gave him the nickname of el llorón, or “cry baby.”
57
The UCR had often been characterized as a party of “committees,” with a set of notables, rather
than a mobilizing and bureaucratized mass party. The Coordinadora aimed to transform the UCR
into a mass-mobilizing party.
58
In that sense, in order to perform well in the political arena, Alfonsín decided to make the UCR
more similar, in these respects, to Peronism. This strategy paid off politically during most of the
1980s, although it can be criticized from a normative standpoint.
 Ostiguy 83

59.
Adelina de Viola, in contrast to other UCeDe leaders, maintained a lower-middle-class cultural
demeanor. Significantly, de Viola defected to the PJ in 1994.
60.
See also on that topic Norden (1996: 136–39; 213). Apparently, the Carapintadas also had ties
to low-right Peronists such as some ex-Iron Guard members. Aldo Rico, after forming his own,
independent political party, eventually joined with Peronism in the mid-1990s.
61
In the Province of Buenos Aires in 1985, the UCR won 41.5% of the vote, the Frente
Renovador 27%, and the FREJULI, 9.7% (Ministerio del Interior).
62
Menem’s behavior is thus much more in line with the directional theory of voting than with the
proximity model. On that topic, see the numerous articles of George Rabinowitz.
63
I wish to express my thanks to Steve Levitsky for the numerous feedback and intellectual
exchanges that gave birth to this section, as well as for the more general editing work from which
sections of this paper benefited.
64
In-depth interviews carried out among low-income residents of Greater Buenos Aires found that
the primary reason given for supporting the Menem government was not its economic policies,
but the fact that it was Peronist (Ostiguy 1998: chapter 6).
65
For Teichman, a policy network in Latin America is an economic-policy, technocratic clique,
tightly integrated and bound by personal relations, that is located inside the coalition in power but
that is often at odds with the interests of the coalition partners. Such policy networks have
ramifications downward within the state and civil society and upward within international lending
agencies (2001:16–22). At a more general level, Weyland (1996) made the argument that
populism in the post–mass-party organization phase is highly compatible with neoliberalism.
Roberts, a year earlier (1995), made a similar argument, although focusing more on targeted
clientelism (which he still sees as being against a pure free market logic).
66
This latter case assumes that a whole group of voters, defined sociologically, respond to only
one type of appeals. As I argue in this paper, however, voters politically on the high-right
(especially within the upper-middle class) and on the low-left (particularly within the popular
sectors) had to “decide,” or respond, between conflicting sets of appeals.
67
In Argentina, vast sectors of the population have been at different times between 1955 and
1983 without access to any machine politics, and not under the umbrella of a union, but Peronism
remained very much alive as a political identity.
68
EPH (Encuesta Permanente de Hogares), of the Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Censo,
Ministerio de Economía, República Argentina, or National Institute of Statistics and Census,
Ministry of the Economy, Republic of Argentina.
84 Ostiguy

69
In my interviews, 55% of the lower-sector Peronist sympathizers rejected the new economic
orientation; 25% said it was necessary, but did not like it; and 20% agreed with it (1998: 466).
In November 1989, Domingo Cavallo was evaluated as “good” by 63% of the high
socioeconomic level, but by only 30% in the low socioeconomic level (Equas 23). In March
1990, at a difficult moment, the percentage of respondents giving a “good/very good” evaluation
of the economic policy was more than twice as high in the high socioeconomic level as it was in
the low; inversely, 72% of the low socioeconomic level evaluated the economic policy as bad,
compared to 50% in the high socioeconomic level (Equas 26). In August 1991, the economic plan
was far more popular among the high socioeconomic level than Menem was, while the reverse
held true in the low socioeconomic level. The high socioeconomic level then gave a 75% rate of
approval to the economic plan, but only a 44% approval rating to Menem (Equas 43). The
approval rating for the economic plan was 24 points lower among the low socioeconomic level.
The social differences in attitudes toward privatization are consistent with this picture.
The middle and the high socioeconomic levels gave an approval rating of 70% and 68%,
respectively, to privatization; only 26% and 29%, respectively, disagreed with them. Among the
lower socioeconomic level, opinions were about equally divided (Equas 26). (See next note for
description of Equas.)
70
All surveys are from the survey firm Equas, which the survey firm Sofres-Ibope in Argentina
inherited. Each survey was numbered and archived under such a number by Equas. The very
numerous cross-tabulations sheets derived from each those surveys and printed for the customers
who ordered the survey are available from the author.
71
See preceding note.
72
See note above, as well as Ostiguy (1998) on voting patterns. My substantive conclusions on
political behavior are thus very different, to say the least, from those reached by Stokes (2001).
The issue can only be resolved by comparing empirical survey data that is socially differentiated.
My conclusions, based on the wide collection of Sofres-Ibope surveys in my possession, are also
very much in line with my own field experience on the ground and with my interviews in the
lower-sector areas of the Greater Buenos Aires, a stronghold of Peronism.
73
Canton and Jorrat, leading experts in quantitative political sociology of voting behavior, have
also highlighted in their work the key, determining importance of partisan identity in Peronist
voting behavior, including during the 1990s (Canton and Jorrat 2002: 420, 424). In Ostiguy
(1998), I empirically studied the phenomenon both qualitatively (through interviews) and
quantitatively.
 Ostiguy 85

74
A notable exception is Dominguez and McCann (1995) on attitudes on policy issues in Mexico
(where political identities are moreover weaker, emotionally, than in Argentina).
75
Our own research (Ostiguy 1998) and that of Canton and Jorrat (2002) strongly support that
claim.
76
A good parallel, admittedly much more emotionally charged than that of political identity in
Argentina but sharing a similar dynamic logic, is that of soccer club membership and identity, for
which people even kill or get killed in that country. The logic of identity has an important social
and individual function.
77
Peronism, after all, is largely about the success of “one of ours” to the shiny and glamorous
attributes of power, without renouncing the link with the pueblo. Evita also conspicuously
displayed jewelry and furs, without renouncing, on the contrary, the affective link with the
descamisados. A similar phenomenon also occurs with pop singers or professional sport idols,
whether in boxing (Gatica) or soccer (Maradona).
78
For example, when announcing in a Greater Buenos Aires shantytown that he was going to
make English compulsory in primary schools, Menem added, in a marked crescendo: “...and this
way, we will be able to tell the Brits, in their own language, that the Malvinas are Argentine!”
79
See also Nun (1995) for a similar analysis, contemporary to the initial drafts of this research.
80
MODIN peaked at 9 percent of the national vote (13 percent in the province of Buenos Aires)
in 1994. This electoral support was concentrated among the poor, and MODIN consistently
performed best in Peronist strongholds such as the second belt of Greater Buenos Aires.
81
Though of minor electoral significance, the support of the wealthy sectors was critical to
Menem’s ability to attract international investment and remain securely in power.
82
Canton and Jorrat (2002: 422) find a similar, but more pronounced pattern. As they state: “[For
the first time, class did] not emerge as a crucial factor vis-à-vis political identification in
1995…One possible explanation is that the middle and upper-middle classes adhered to the new
economic policies heralded by the Peronist candidate, combining the traditional working-class
constituency of Peronist electorate with the higher strata. This ultimately might have produced the
statistical insignificance of the class variable.” However, in 1999, the “upper-middle class sectors
who had voted for Peronism in 1995 moved either to the Alianza or to a third party, headed by
former Minister of Economics, Domingo Cavallo” (ibid: 423).
83
Within the most endowed sectors of society, there is a striking difference in political
preferences between those with the highest educational level, who tended to be on the high (and
86 Ostiguy

often on the high-left in fact) and to clearly oppose Menemism, and those with the highest
economic level, who tended to be on the high-right and often favored Menemism.
84
While the reaction within the Peronist popular sectors to the new neoliberal orientation aroused
a lot of academic interest, the even higher level of concern, irritation, and unhappiness within
those same Peronist popular sectors for the new unconditional alignment of the PJ government on
the United States (characterized by the PJ leadership in a characteristically low fashion as a
relación carnal (carnal relationship) has gone largely unnoticed and unstudied.
85
Many people on the high-right opposed Menem, such as Mario Grondona for example,
certainly not from the left, but as high. That is, their belief in the high trumped their economically
right-wing convictions. For Bernardo Neustadt, it was just the reverse.
86
Cavallo has an image that is less conspicuously high than that of the Alsogaray family, which
one associates more readily with the wealthy neighborhood of Barrio Norte. Evolving with his
time, Cavallo has attempted to present a more modernist, technological, pro-enterprise, US-like
image, although he remains popular generally in the same social sectors as the previous UCeDe.
Cavallo, as always more right than high, also formed a temporary alliance with the sector
most to the right and to the high of Peronism in Capital, led by Gustavo Beliz.
87
For an analysis of the constitutional reform, see Cheresky (1999: 273–311).
88
Novaro and Palermo (1998: 132) present a similar, although not identical, argument.
89
Álvarez had the support of the political organizations constituting most of the FREPASO,
including the FG, the newly incorporated US, as well as the unions sympathetic to the
FREPASO. Novaro and Palermo make the same point (1998:144).
90
Página/12, 3 April 1994, pp. 3–4.
91
The economically right-wing turn of Menem, together with his new social alliances, certainly
created severe tensions for Ubaldini. Ubaldini even ran on a separate Peronist ballot in 1991, but
received few votes. In contrast to much higher unions such as the Asociación Trabajadores del
Estado (State Workers’ Association, or ATE) (white-collar state employees) and the
Confederación de Trabajadores de la Educación de la República Argentina (Confederation of
Education Workers of Argentina, or CTERA) (teachers), Ubaldini could not break with Peronism,
the “movement of the Argentine pueblo.” As with other left Peronists, he would have to oppose
(without success) from within.
92
What used to be called the “Capital Federal” and is now called the Autonomous City of Buenos
Aires is the equivalent of the DF in Mexico or of DC in the US. It is a “state” that is not a state,
the core of a city that is almost a state, or to be more precise a city which has been “federalized,”
 Ostiguy 87

as the nation’s capital. Up to 1996, the executive power of Federal Capital was a civil servant
appointed by the president (and ratified by the Senate), with the name (itself originating in the
colonial period) of intendant. Since the executive head is now elected, he or she is called chief of
government.
93
It is not possible to repeatedly cross the main cleavage of Argentine politics with impunity.
After leaving the FREPASO, Bordón tried to come back to the PJ; his political career, however,
was by then over.
94
Declaration made on 31 March 1998, quoted in Microsemanario 312.
95
”Porteno” refers to residents of the Federal Capital, which is a port city.
96
As governor, Duhalde visited poor neighborhoods on an almost daily basis, eating choripanes
(local chorizo “hotdogs”), sharing maté, and playing cards with people. He also insisted on being
called “negro.” (Interview with Alberto Perez, a former PJ leader in Buenos Aires, by Steven
Levitsky, October 1996).
97
This last section borrows heavily from Ostiguy (2005), in French, translated into English in the
March 2006 LASA paper “Peronist and non-Peronist Lefts: The Argentine Party System in the
Kirchner Era.”
98
Ramón Puerta (21–23 December 2001), Adolfo Rodriguez Saá (23 December–1 January 2002),
and Eduardo Camaño (1–2 January 2002). All told, Argentina saw five presidents in two weeks,
if Fernando De la Rúa and Eduardo Duhalde are included.
99
The punteros are the agents of political clientelism who distribute goods of primary necessity in
exchange for political and social support; they work in the underprivileged communities and are
associated with Peronism. According to S. Levitsky, “[the punteros] use personal ties, persuasion,
and material favors to construct a clientele, which permits them to act as the guardians of their
area’s votes. They then take these votes to the negotiating table with the local politicians, who
offer them jobs and other state resources in return for their support” (Levitsky 2003:67; see also
Auyero 2000). On a political analysis of clientelism in Argentina, see the masterful articles of
Calvo and Murillo (2004, 2005).
100
Regarding the fortuitousness of Kirchner coming to power, Cheresky (2004b: 27–36 ) makes a
similar argument, well documented with survey data and contextual historical analysis.
101
Cheresky certainly strongly makes this point. While he has repeatedly stated it, the most
explicit formulation is in Cheresky (2006a: 13–23), in the edited volume tellingly titled La
política después de los partidos (Politics after Political Parties).
88 Ostiguy

On party system fragmentation and party system polarization see, for example,
Mainwaring and Pérez-Liñan (2005: 24–25).
102
Since Carlos Menem was at that time president of the National Council (i.e., the executive) of
the Justicialist Party (PJ), and held at his disposal a real possibility to manipulate the electoral
register of the PJ to his own advantage in a primary, President Duhalde, who enjoyed majority
support in Peronist circles, convened a national congress of the Justicialist Party and obtained
from the delegates a majority vote to cancel the primary and permit the three principal
preliminary candidates for president to participate directly and separately in the general election.
With Peronism’s dominance at the national level assured by a long shot, the PJ’s primaries
became in a sense open and national. The goal of the original maneuver was to avoid Menem
becoming the official Peronist candidate, which would have guaranteed him the presidency.
103
For a comparative perspective on party systems in Latin America, see the major edited volume
by Mainwaring and Scully (1995).
104
The radical president De la Rúa was at the immediate source of the 2001 crisis, which majorly
affected the popularity of his party. Nevertheless, both non-Peronist presidential candidates were
of a Radical origin, since Elisea Carrió, the leader of ARI (Argentinos por una República de
Iguales), was a longtime Radical deputy before founding ARI, and Ricardo López Murphy was a
militant with the Radical Youth as well as a cabinet member and finance minister under the
Radical presidency of De la Rúa.
105
This thesis, running counter to the institutionalism prevalent in American political science
today, is very close to René Rémond’s classic work on the rights in France, where political
“currents” or “tendencies” are much more stable than parties. These currents can certainly be
situated spatially, as Rémond does with them on the left-right spectrum. The specific character of
the Argentine party system lies not so much in the “precedence” (or “anteriority”) of the current
or spatial position over party organization, as in its two-dimensionality.
106
Gorila (gorilla) is the pejorative expression used by Peronists to designate those who hold
fierce anti-Peronist sentiments and are perceived as scornful of the “unclean,” “ignorant,” and
“noisy” classes.
107
The presidential elections of April 2003 were the first following the “get rid of them all!”: the
politicians overtly sought to demonstrate “that they were not all alike.”
108
During the campaign, Carrió and Rodríguez Saá lost the most ground (partly to Kirchner),
whereas López Murphy gained the most. The final results of the first round of presidential
 Ostiguy 89

elections on April 27, 2003 were: Menem, 24.5%; Kirchner, 22.2%; López Murphy, 16.4%;
Rodríguez Saá, 14.1%; Carrió, 14.1%
109
For an excellent analysis of the 2005 legislative elections, see Cheresky (2006b: 53–63). For
that time period, see also Levitsky and Murillo (2008).
110
Each tendency has its own interpretation of Peronism, which it considers most legitimate.
Though ideologically very far from one another, these tendencies—like most things in
Peronism—are informal. Their fortune depends on the power acquired by certain leaders when
they delimit their own ideological projects.
Seen from another angle, the tendencies are not ideological projects (on the left-right
axis) capable of existing independently of the party in question, but rather diverse interpretations
of what constitutes “real” Peronism. Paradoxically, this situation leads to a reduced tolerance for
the inevitable, stubborn “interpretive adversaries,” who are not perceived as a legitimate minority
but instead as “mistaken.” A better parallel would seem to be that of divergent Christian
interpretations (“tendencies”) in relation to a mortal pope.
111
Not surprisingly, considering our very definition of the “high,” such a family of parties have
chosen as the key, characterizing epithet for their political formation the label of “civic.” This
pole of the divide is quite in line with how this political divide should be comparatively
understood--even if such dichotomy or polarity is rarely used, if it all, in the political science
literature on the topic. Obviously, such self-characterization is normatively highly positive, so the
literature then needs to use an equally positive label for the other pole, in order to be acceptable.
For that reason, we prefer “high” and “low”, as defined and described above.
112
Argentines refer to this “feeling,” to this “soul of Peronism,” as the mística peronista, or
Peronist mystic.
90 Ostiguy

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